


Can’t Take That Away From Me

by SophiaCatherine



Series: One More Cup of Coffee (Before I Go) [2]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst with a Hopeful Ending, Betrayal, Fluff and Angst, Identity Porn, Identity Reveal, In this house we respect Iris West, Kidnapping, Lakeside picnics and making breakfast and other fluffy-as-pancakes stuff, M rating for whump, M/M, The Rogues As Family (The Flash), Whump, and no one threatens Len’s family, but also do expect angst because it’s me and I wrote this as pure self-indulgence you’re welcome, but there are Circumstances, psychic torture, really aiming for that hopeful ending tag though, that should be a tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-07-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:27:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 46,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24326494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SophiaCatherine/pseuds/SophiaCatherine
Summary: Captain Cold is done with the Flash foiling his heists, and he’s way past done with the Scarlet Speedster hurting his Rogues. If he arranges for him to be taken out of the picture for a while, could anyone blame him?And then, with no one to get in his way, Len can get through this next job and go home and spend some well-deserved time with his boyfriend, Barry.
Relationships: Barry Allen & Iris West, Barry Allen/Leonard Snart, Leonard Snart & Lisa Snart
Series: One More Cup of Coffee (Before I Go) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1813276
Comments: 321
Kudos: 371





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Set in a vaguely season-three-era AU in which Len and Barry never learned each other’s identities (and Len and Mick never joined the Legends).
> 
> I‘m not sure if the upcoming whump (see tags) goes into ‘graphic descriptions of violence’ territory, but I‘ve added that tag for safety. It definitely won’t be _very_ graphic.

The glint of cold light through the window, barely enough to make out shapes and shadows through gray darkness, leaving him straining his eyes to try.

The echoing insistent drip-drip-drip of a leak, somewhere off in a corner. 

The scratchy carpet and hard floor underneath him. The blue flare of the meta cuffs around the pipe, wrenching him half upright. The deep ache in his deadened arms. The desperate fight against the siren song of sleep, head dropping, jerking up again, eyes blinking open _not safe don’t sleep—_

All these indignities can’t keep one absurd thought away. 

_Len will save me._

The irony hurts worse than anything he’s been through today.

Through a clenched-tight jaw, Barry forces himself to list the more realistic possibilities for rescue. The indomitable Jay. The Harry and Jesse superteam. Oliver and company. Even the Legends, if they wanted to let this complete _fuck up_ get just a bit worse before stumbling into an unlikely solution. Team Flash has more reliable, trustworthy heroes on speed dial than pizza restaurants.

He’s _pathetic._ All the heroes in the multiverse could be looking for him, and Barry’s yearning for one of his villains. He can’t even trust his own feelings not to betray him. He can’t trust anything.

Anyone.

His elbow clangs hard against the pipe he’s chained to. (Pain shoots like lightning up his arm. He barely notices.) Who even _is_ he anymore? Barry Allen, scientist, CSI, graduated in the top five percent of his class... and the guy so busy falling in love with his adoring bad boy maybe-boyfriend, he let himself ignore that well-trained alarm in his head, wailing out that something was wrong. 

That actually makes him laugh. He was dating one of the Rogues without knowing it. He sped past ‘wrong’ a few miles back.

If he’d just trusted his instincts, his adoring bad boy maybe-boyfriend wouldn’t be the reason he’s here now. Captured, de-powered, and chained to a pipe in a warehouse.

Because of Captain Cold. The criminal. The supervillain. 

The guy he’s been dating.

If anyone’s coming to save him, it’s not Len.

* * *

One Week Earlier 

Barry wakes to the sound of singing.

He turns his head to take in the other side of the bed—the wrinkled sheets, the empty space. Looks like he pulled all the blankets over to his side in the night, which explains why the other occupant hasn’t made his side of the bed, indulging Barry in his messiness. Smiling, Barry kicks the entire mess of blankets onto the floor and gets up.

He ambles to the kitchen in a blurry haze. Between the early hour and not being able to use his speed, the short walk down the hall feels endless. But given how often his boyfriend has stayed over recently, Barry’s getting used to that.

 _Boyfriend._ Barry isn’t sure the guy who shares his bed—and increasingly, his life—would like that. He’s the type to take things slow. Barry’s got enough self-awareness to have noticed his own opposite tendency to speed in first and think later. But not this time. If Barry hasn’t got as far as asking about the b-word, it’s only because this thing is too good to screw up by moving too fast.

Enticed around the corner by the smell of browning pancakes and the sounds of his whatever-he-is singing jazz standards, he decides his life is too perfect for deep thoughts.

 _“The way your smile just beams,”_ filters out of the kitchen. It’s a little off-tempo, the singer drawing out the lazy words. _“The way you sing off-key…”_

Barry is trying not to grin like a complete fool as he steps into the kitchen. “Morning, Len,” he murmurs, wrapping his arms around him from behind. 

Len stays facing the stove, raising his baritone over the sizzle of frying eggs. “ _The way you—_ mmm, good morning, Barry.” He turns around to flash Barry a grin and spins back to the stove. _“No, no, they can’t take that away from me...”_

Barry’s still smiling as he drops into his seat at the table, where butter, maple syrup and flatware are all laid out, waiting. For him. He takes a deep breath to calm his heart, jumping speedster-quick in his chest. The idea that someone else could be this excited to see him is still too new and exhilarating. Barry has moments when he can’t figure out how this relationship—if that’s what it is—can be so perfect. When he wonders how he ended up with this guy, who makes him pancakes and takes him on moonlit picnics and treats him like he deserves it all.

“I can hear you thinking from here,” Len says, flipping pancakes onto a ready pile. “Go on, tell the barkeep all your troubles.”

Barry feels his lips thin, wondering if Len knows what he’s asking. Telling the truth hasn’t always been safe for him, and over the years Barry’s gotten out of the habit of revealing pretty much anything about how he feels, what he’s thinking. But this is Len. Barry tries not to smile at his waiting plate. “Just wondering how I got this lucky.” 

“Your latte got mixed up with my cappuccino at Jitters.”

He rolls his eyes. “I didn’t mean literally.”

Len grins, stepping around to bring Barry his plate, pausing to give him a soft kiss. Barry tastes the pancakes Len has clearly sampled in advance, and smiles against him. Pulling away, Len runs a hand through Barry’s hair and asks, “Does that help quiet down that head of yours?”

Barry pretends to consider it. “A bit more of that _definitely_ would.”

Len chuckles, grabbing his own plate and taking his seat next to Barry. “I’m sure that can be arranged.”

There’s a warm silence for a few minutes, nothing but the soft clatter of forks against plates, and no need to fill the space with chatter. Barry tries not to slide into deep thoughts again, but by his second pancake he’s been tempted back onto the carousel. But even his endlessly spinning thoughts are good when they’re about Len. It’s just so _easy_ with him. 

He glances up and Len’s just smiling at him. Softly, as though Barry has surprised him. Barry points a fork. “Good pancakes.”

Len’s smile pulls at the edges into a smirk, somewhere between self-satisfied and besotted. “I try.” He tilts his head. “For you.” 

It’s been three months. Barry should not still be feeling like a lovesick teenager. But when Len’s this adorable, how can he not?

“So,” Barry asks through a full mouth, “what are you up to this week?”

And Len... pauses. 

“Oh, you know,” he says, recovering so quickly, so fluently that Barry wouldn’t have noticed the pause at all if this weren’t _Len,_ for whom words come so easy that he never has to think before answering a question. “Overtime at work.”

Barry puts down his fork. “At the museum?”

“Yeah,” Len replies, this time without missing a beat. “Griegson’s down two curators with flu. City’s doing that damn ‘culture week’ thing next week—waste of taxpayers’ money, but what do I know? City museums are running special exhibits. Got one on Banksy—you believe that? The auction house is even bringing in a Renoir. They’re gonna be busy.” He takes another bite. “Still, good time to be in the security business.”

Barry has played poker with Len. The guy thinks he doesn’t have any tells, but Barry knows better. When he’s telling the truth, Len gets this light in his eyes, free and easy, like when he said Barry made him happier than anything had in a long time. When he’s planning something, there’s an intensity to his face, the slightest pinch of lines across his forehead—just how he looked before he surprised Barry with a late-night lakeside picnic on his birthday. When he’s anxious, his hands fidget, out of sight, till Barry takes hold of them and finds subtle ways to let him know everything’s going to be okay. And when he’s lying… he doesn’t stop talking. Details come pouring out, like he’s hiding the truth in plain sight, buried so deep under mundane trivia that no one would ever think to look there for it.

Barry trusts his maybe-boyfriend implicitly in matters of the heart, but he’s not sure he trusts him at all when it comes to pretty much anything else.

Which is fine, Barry reminds himself, as he studies his half-eaten second pancake. Len isn’t the only one keeping secrets. It’s something of an unspoken agreement between them. They’re three months into the most intense relationship Barry’s ever had, and they barely sleep apart anymore, but neither of them has told each other about much about their lives. 

Barry’s _extra-curricular_ activities have definitely not come up.

“Sounds like you’ll be busy this week,” Barry offers, hoping his voice doesn’t come out too guarded.

Len leans across the table to smile at him, and the light is back in his eyes. Those fierce, ice-blue eyes, the first thing Barry noticed about him, over swapped drinks at Jitters. Those eyes that had him falling for Len way too fast. “Only for a few days,” Len promises. “How about you come to my place on Friday night? I’ll have the projector installed by then. You pick the movie.” 

Barry gives in, smiling back at him. “Sounds good.” He reaches for Len’s empty plate, stacking it on top of his own. “And I’m free today if you want to hang out. How about we go to Home Depot and get some seedlings, and do some planting out there?” Barry gestures out the window at his mess of a tiny courtyard garden, overlooked by the rest of the building, where empty pots are stacked on top of each other. But, as Len follows his gaze, a little wistfully, Barry already knows the answer is no.

Barry hasn’t failed to notice that his significant other is careful where he’s seen. They don’t hang out in public—the late-night picnic out at the lakeside was just one of the ways Len’s gone to _interesting_ lengths to spend time together out of public view. He keeps odd hours, and always takes Barry to the same neat apartment, but it doesn’t look lived-in enough to be the only place he stays. And Barry’s never met Len’s family, even though he talks about his sister and his best friend like they mean the world to him. 

The guy has secrets. And Barry doesn’t know how worried he should be about that.

Firmly, he reminds himself that Len will let him in when he’s ready. There’s definitely no need for Barry to go rooting around trying to find out more about him. He’s just respecting Len’s privacy... he tells himself. Often.

Conspicuously changing the subject, Len asks, “What about you? CCPD got you busy this week?” He’s arching an eyebrow as though he knows the answer.

Barry takes a sip of coffee before he answers, “Yeah, they’re really keeping me on my toes at the moment.”

“Got you working a lot of late nights,” Len agrees, his voice coming out on a forced-casual note as he reaches for the pile of empty plates. Getting up, he turns away to the sink.

“I can do that,” Barry offers.

Len waves him away without turning around. “Least I can do.”

Len is one of the sharpest people Barry’s ever known. There’s no way he just _hasn’t noticed._ All the cancelled dates, last minute changes of plans. And Barry’s disappearances—sometimes for weeks, like the last time they went to Earth-2, when he only had time to leave Len a note, hoping he wouldn’t ask too many questions when Barry got back... Of course Len’s noticed. 

He lets Barry have his secrets, too.

Sometimes, Barry lets himself wonder if there couldn’t be something more virtuous behind the mystery of Len. Even turned away from him at the sink, Barry knows his face well enough to trace the lines of it, imagining ice-blue eyes framed by a black mask. He can too easily imagine Len as a shadowy vigilante. In darker shades than Barry—perhaps with echoes of Oliver, but with a little more style. Fighting the good fight in the name of the helpless. No reward needed.

Okay, so it’s not _likely,_ but it’s possible. 

So what if there are things Barry doesn’t know about Len? What’s important is the one truth he does know, unshakable as the ground he runs on—Len is _good._

Barry lets himself indulge the hero fantasy for a moment. Meeting side-by-side in a fight for innocent lives… Len unmasking Barry... Taking him back to his dark, dusty base so they can get reacquainted out of costume...

Len has turned back to look at him, eyes narrowed. He sinks back into the seat next to Barry’s and reaches over to take his hand. Warm fingers wrap soft and firm around his, and Barry feels his speedster-fast heart start to slow down. “Sorry, Barry. Not really the gardening type. How about we just stay inside?” His voice drops till he’s damn near purring. “I’m sure a couple of imaginative guys like us can find ways to have a little _fun_ this morning.”

Barry swallows a sigh, but he can’t fight a smile back at Len. He stomps down on that cruel little voice in his head telling him this relationship—if that’s what it is—is a terrible idea. This thing he’s got with Len is good. Can’t he have just one good thing, untouched and untwisted by the part of him that’s the Flash, safe from all the pain and horror that comes with that life? _Just_ _one thing,_ he begs the multiverse, as he leans in to kiss Len, who reciprocates eagerly. 

Len makes a soft sound low in his throat. His lips are warm, firm, insistent. And everything Barry doesn’t want to think about right now, secrets and distractions and his life as the Flash—it all just melts away. Like butter on pancakes. Like ice cream at late night lakeside picnics, with a fire burning at their feet.

Fuck the questions. Barry is having this. Reluctantly, he pulls away from Len’s enticing lips. “Staying here sounds nice.”

Len beams at him, one hand still warm on Barry’s cheek, and Barry’s going to need to see Caitlin if his heart rate keeps racing off like this. “Hey, Len,” he murmurs.

“Barry,” comes the smooth reply.

“Are we in a relationship?”

Amused eyes dart up to meet his. “I suppose so,” Len drawls. A rare uneasy shadow crosses his face. “Are you okay with that?”

Len’s fingers are stroking little circles into the back of Barry’s hand. Barry wonders which of them he’s trying to reassure. Heartened by Len’s sincere reply, he shrugs. “I can think of worse things.”

Len nods. “I think I can live with it,” he says seriously, with a truly adorable smirk.

They end up far too busy to talk about the b-word that day. Barry can’t say he minds, in the end.

* * *

“How’s your boy toy?” Lisa calls out before Len even has a foot in the door of the Rogues’ base. 

Sighing internally, he raises a wry eyebrow at her. “Good morning to you too, sis. Can I get an update on the auction house job?”

Lisa is heading for the rickety workbench at the back of the warehouse that’s currently serving as a makeshift kitchen. “Geez, Lenny, you’re barely inside. Take a load off. Let me make you a coffee.” She shoots him a smirk over her shoulder that reminds him far too much of himself. She can’t _already_ be plotting something. 

He aims a sarcastic smile back at her. “He’s fine. There’s your update. Now can we get down to business, please?”

She just grins back at him as she pours coffees from the filter jug—just three of them. He raises an eyebrow and she shrugs. “Hartley didn’t show. You can send Mick to kick his ass later.”

Len pulls his gun just so he can mock-aim it at Hartley’s spare gauntlets, where he’s just left them out on the table, ruining the clean lines and orderly layout of Len’s workspace. “Rathaway’s on _thin ice.”_

“Be nice, Lenny,” Lisa chides. “We need him and his tech. We’re fighting literal superheroes here. Or have you forgotten?”

Len shakes his head. “Couldn’t forget that. City’s lousy with them. If Piper thinks that makes him indispensable, he’s wrong.” He lowers the cold gun, slowly. “No one is.”

She makes a cynical noise. “Ooh. Scary.”

He’s used to Lisa not taking him seriously. She might be the only thing keeping his persona from going all-out moustache-twirling histrionic evil genius, and even Len has to admit that’s probably for the best. He holsters his gun. “And Shawna?”

“Gone to scope out the target.” Lisa heaps three spoonfuls of sugar into Mick’s mug, emblazoned with flames down one side. His favorite. Len might have stolen that one for him—he can’t remember. 

“At least one member of this crew is a professional.” He raises his voice just enough to make an impression on his layabout pyromaniac partner. “Mick, get in here.”

Mick’s rumble appears before he does. “Yeah yeah, quit your whining.” He steps in from the shadows, sitting down at the crummy table at the center of the warehouse space. The mug has turned up in his hand like it belongs there. Len refuses to smile at it. “Auction house job.” Mick takes a swig of coffee, while Len and Lisa join him around the table. “How we keeping the red freak off our case while we’re there?”

Len shrugs one shoulder at him. “Don’t worry, Mick. There’s a plan.”

Lisa, who’s been scanning the mess of documents laid out in front of them, turns and meets Mick’s eye, holds his gaze for a moment, and then turns back to Len. Oh good—a conspiracy. Just what he needs. “The Flash has been been getting bolder,” Lisa says carefully. “We up our game, he ups his. So that plan better be foolproof, Lenny.”

Len pauses at the hint of a wobble in her voice, giving away the lie of her confident words. 

A couple of months ago, during what should have been a straightforward warehouse job, the Flash left Lisa with a broken arm. It was not a good day. Len doesn’t know if the Scarlet Speedster intended to hurt her, and he doesn’t care. The Rogues have been trying to stay out of sight of the red nuisance ever since.

He focuses his eyes on the plans. “Lot’s valued at fifteen mil. There’s a Renoir in the mix. Think I’m risking that?” He doesn’t look up at the tense silence, but he adds, “The little leather-clad menace ain’t coming near any of us.”

“What’s the plan, Lenny?” Lisa asks again, insistent.

Len allows himself a casual glance up. When Lisa’s faking her smile, it gets tight around the edges. He doesn’t like what that stirs in him.

Beside her, Mick shifts in his seat. There’s an unsettling flicker of nervous energy in his eyes. Until the Flash, Len hadn’t seen Mick look scared for—years, probably. Maybe not since they were scrappy kids, with nothing but each other between them and monsters worse than the Scarlet Speedster could ever be. 

_He’s not gonna touch them._

“Fine.” He drums his fingers on the table, looking between Lisa and Mick. “There’s a new player in town. Knows how to handle metas. We’re scratching each other’s backs. Let’s just say the Flash won’t be a problem anymore—not till his little team rescues him.” He turns back to the papers, indulging in a satisfied drawl. “Which I’m told could take a _while.”_

“You’re selling the Flash out?” Lisa’s grin sparkles, relief strong in her eyes. It settles something sharp and restless inside Len. 

He leans back in his chair. _“Lisa._ Don’t make us sound so common.” He returns her smile with a smirk. “We just _happen_ to have found a handy trap door. The Flash is the one who’s gonna walk right in.” He gestures at the papers on the table. “Two-part plan. Just in time to take him out of the picture for the auction house job. First, we get him out of the woodwork, annoy him a bit. Then we tempt him over to a follow-up event…” 

Len pauses again for effect, letting the excitement build before he launches into the details of the plan. Waiting till even an eye-rolling Mick is visibly paying attention. “Are you sitting comfortably, children? Then I’ll begin.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a date night, and Barry and Len are hoping for more of those... once Len just gets this thing with the Flash out of the way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This thing has now grown to a few more chapters than I expected. Should be less than ten, though. Enjoy!

On Friday evening, Barry sticks his head around the door of the Cortex. “Hey,” he says. “I’m heading out. All good here?”

“Yup.” Cisco whistles as he spins in chair at the console. “Damn, Barry. Looking fine.”

Barry grins and gives him a little twirl. “Got a hot date,” he says with only the barest touch of irony. He keeps spare sets of clothes at STAR Labs in case of unexpected jacket-bursting-into-flames situations—they still occasionally happen when he’s trying to stay low-key for the Jitters run—and he’s found a very fetching blue sweater and dark jeans in a locker. He can’t wait to inspire the same look from Len that Cisco’s currently giving him.

But the look has already been replaced by the daggers Cisco glares every time the subject of Len comes up. “Are you sure I can’t do some digging on that guy you’re dating? He gives me some bad vibes, man.” He holds up a hand before Barry can ask. “No, not real vibes—I’ve never got close enough for that. Just the regular kind.”

Eager as he is to get to his date, Barry takes the time to perch on the desk. He’s pretty sure Cisco doesn’t hate Len. They’ve met exactly once, when Cisco stopped by Barry’s apartment and ended up joining them for coffee. But if this relationship is getting as serious as Barry hopes it is, he wants his friends to like the guy he’s dating. “He’s fine, Cisco. No vibes necessary, the meta kind or otherwise. And didn’t we already talk about this? Letting you hack into his social media wouldn’t exactly show a lot of trust.” His friend raises a very skeptical eyebrow, and Barry sighs. “Look, I have the CCPD criminal database at my literal fingertips if I’m worried. But I’m not.” 

He hopes he sounds confident about that.

Cisco opens his mouth to reply, but he’s interrupted by the wail of an alarm filling the Cortex. Virtuoso fingers swipe through screens, playing data like a piano. “Incident at the bank on Eighth and Milton.” 

Over his shoulder, Barry frowns at a pattern on the screen. “That’s a temperature drop, right?” He’s getting a familiar feeling, foreboding mixed with an odd excitement, his limbs itching to run. 

Cisco groans. “I’m way past done with these Rogues and their Goodfellas crap. Can’t you just kick Cold’s ass all the way to Iron Heights?”

“We have a deal, Cisco.” Barry jumps off the desk. “He doesn’t get curious and try to unmask me, and he doesn’t kill anyone, and I don’t speed him to jail. That deal is saving lives.” 

“Sure,” Cisco mutters. “ _That’s_ the reason you let him use the city as his personal playground.”

Suiting up, Barry pauses to roll his eyes at the jab. Cisco’s always accusing him of flirting with Cold. Hardly. “You’re on comms?”

Cisco indicates the empty Cortex with a wave of his hand. “You see anyone else here? I’ve got your back, dude. Go, already.”

Barry’s gone already. The city flickers and flares around him, reshaping itself into the marble shine of a bank.

Other than the costumed Rogues, the place is empty. Barry spots a grinning Peek-A-Boo in a corner and raises his vibrating voice. “How thoughtful of you to get everyone out.”

She beams from behind her yellow mask. “Wouldn’t want any pesky victims messing up your deal with my boss, now, would we?” 

“Actually,” a voice drawls behind him, “the thoughtfulness was all mine. So _glad_ you appreciate it.” 

There’s always something about Cold’s voice, even deepened by the voice-altering tech he uses. Barry has to resist smiling every time he hears that charming drawl. It’s kind of familiar, too, although he can never quite place it. 

Barry spins around. Cold has his hood up, goggles fixed tight over his eyes, keeping his distance, as always. The Flash may banter with him a little, may even flirt occasionally ( _okay,_ Cisco?), but he’s never spent enough time in Cold’s company to get a sense of who he might be. The Rogues pull in-and-out jobs. And ever since one of them got hurt in a struggle in a jewelry heist at a warehouse, a few months ago, it’s like they’ve been trying to stay off the Flash’s radar entirely.

The accident was Barry’s fault. He was moving too fast, grabbing at a flit-flitting Peek-A-Boo, when Golden Glider stepped into his path. The Rogues have always seemed invincible to him, and he can too easily forget that they’re not all metas. Golden Glider’s stomach-turning scream will be a reminder of their very human fragility for a long time. 

Now Barry glances around the huge bank with its marble counters and gold lamps. “What’s with the flashy heist? Thought you guys didn’t go in for those anymore.” He aims a cocky smile at Cold. “What happened to _so good we don’t need the publicity of high profile targets?”_

Cold hasn’t moved, keeping the counter between himself and the Flash. He lifts a dramatic shoulder in a shrug. “We’re busy, Flash. You gonna try to stop us, or do you want to banter?” Under the huge hood, Barry glimpses a hint of a smirk. “I’m sure I can make time... for you, Scarlet.”

Barry pulls his face back from the smile threatening to break out without his permission. The Rogues are never this entertaining anymore. “You know I can’t let you walk away from here with that, Cold.”

“Cute.” Cold tilts his head almost seductively. “And yet, you’re still talking. Think of the fun we could be having instead.”

In Barry’s ear, Cisco agrees. _“Barry, quit flirting and speed them to CCPD!”_

And that’s when an abrupt gust of wind blows the doors open, and Weather Wizard saunters into the bank. “Flash! Good to see you.”

“Shit,” Barry mutters into his comms. “Since when is he working with them again?”

There’s a tap-tapping in his ear—probably Cisco calculating something at the computer. _“You can still take them all down, Barry. You just need to build up some speed and throw a lightning bolt at Weather Wizard.”_

Barry’s eye is drawn to Golden Glider. She’s lounging on a counter, her gold mask sparkling under the bright lights of the bank. It hides her identity, but not the look in her eyes.

Team Flash helped her, once. Something with her family that she never fully explained—Cisco got a bomb out of her head and they let her go. She always stayed masked, but she was grateful. 

Now her eyes pin him to his spot with a mix of resentment, fear and cold rage. _I dare you._

 _“Now, Barry!”_ Cisco urges. _“There’s no civilians there to get hurt!”_

No civilians, sure, but...

Barry takes a step back. His hand comes up to his earpiece. “Put out a 911 call.”

_“What?”_

Barry turns off the comms.

In a few seconds, he has emptied the place of cash, stashed it in the safe of a neighboring bank, barred the doors with a couple of two-by-fours lifted from a nearby construction site, and deposited five Rogues out front of the building. 

None of them had time to fight back. That must be why this was so easy. That’s what he’s getting ready to tell Cisco as he runs back to STAR Labs, only vaguely aware of the useless echo of sirens already too late to reach the absconded Rogues.

* * *

Barry clutches the wrapped package to his chest and rings the doorbell. While he waits, he glares down at what he’s brought. He always worries about gifts. He once got a diamond bracelet for a girlfriend when they’d been dating two weeks. She returned it to the store, then broke up with him. Len probably isn’t going to react that way to this little thing, but...

 _“Come on up, Barry.”_ Len’s tinny voice breaks into his negative spiral, warm and welcoming even through the speaker, and Barry smiles. Maybe the gift will be fine.

Len’s apartment is nice—very nice—but still credibly the apartment of a guy who works in security. And Len’s got a reputation for being good at what he does, Barry reminds himself as he walks up sparkling chrome and glass stairs. Okay, it’s a reputation that Barry’s only heard about from Len, but he seems to get good assignments. The museum is his second consultancy position since Barry’s known him. Before that, he was working for some big bank chain or other.

Len is waiting for him at the top of the stairs. He’s leaning in the doorway of his apartment, his arms loosely folded above an entrancing little smile. “You finally made it.”

Barry leans in to kiss him. “Of course. I— _mm_ —I know I can be a bit unreliable...” Len raises his eyebrows at that. “But I wasn’t going to miss movie night.” Only hesitating for a second, Barry hands the package over.

Len frowns at it, tapping the side of the box. “What did you bring?”

Barry takes a chance and winks at him. “Let me in and you’ll find out.”

Len grins and steps aside. “Cute.”

While Len disappears through to the connecting kitchen, Barry flings himself onto the big couch. The new projector screen is huge. “Looks good,” he calls out to the kitchen.

“Took a while to set up,” Len calls back, and Barry smiles at how laid back he sounds. The guy always seemed skittish at having Barry in his home, at least for the first couple of months. That he’s now willing to leave him alone in his living room is a very good sign.

“You didn’t put that up alone?” Barry shouts back.

“Barry, Barry.” Len returns to the room with a tray laden with microwave popcorn and hot chocolate. “How little you think of me. I could absolutely do that alone.” He puts the tray down on the coffee table, and spins on a heel to grin at Barry. “Also, no—Mick helped.” 

Barry snorts in reply. Len takes a seat beside him and leans over to bump Barry’s shoulder with his own. “Hi.” 

“Hi.” Barry hopes his smile isn’t as shy as he feels. “I think you should know I really want to kiss you again. Maybe, you know, for a bit longer this time.”

“Adorable,” Len says coolly, leaning closer in. “Think we can manage that.”

Once they’re finally done making out, the gift Barry’s brought with him is well received. “You bake?” Len asks in a tone of utter incredulity.

Barry passes him one of the homemade brownies. “Sure. Baking’s just like chemistry. All you do is follow a formula.” 

He tries not to laugh in relief when Len bites in, closes his eyes in bliss and says, “Well, whatever the secret is, you can bring these again.” 

As the opening credits of Star Trek: The Motion Picture roll across the huge screen, speakers booming with the rising music, Len asks, “What kept you tonight?” 

Barry shrugs and says, “Work thing,” through a mouthful of brownie.

“Hope no one died.”

Barry shakes his head. “Just a heist—with, uh, some evidence to process.” He glances sideways at Len, who now has an arm wrapped around him. This is perfect. He could stay here forever and die happy. Julian Albert might end up processing his remains, but it would be worth it. 

The long opening shots of the Klingon ships in space begin, and Barry says, “Huh. The screen almost makes this scene look good.”

Len turns his entire head and half of his body to look at Barry, making the movement as snarky as only he can. Disbelief is etched into his face. “Call yourself a Star Trek fan? Tell me you don’t love these shots. To my _face.”_

Barry waves at the screen. “They’re fine, I guess. But this movie is too reliant on special effects and clever shots. Not enough action, not enough story.”

“Not enough... There’s a sentient twentieth-century spacecraft! There’s weird bald sexy telepaths! This is classic sci-fi storytelling!”

Grinning, Barry replies, “And in twenty minutes when we’re still staring at the hull of the Enterprise, I’ll ask if you’re bored yet.”

“You heathen,” Len grumbles, pulling Barry closer. 

Barry closes his eyes for a second, enjoying the comforting pressure of Len’s arm around him. “How was your week?” 

“Uneventful,” Len replies with a shrug. “Couple of hiccups in planning at work. Nothing we can’t handle.”

“Will you end up with a lot of extra work?”

“Shouldn’t do.” Len’s attention seems to be mostly on the screen. “Next week’s the big event.” He shifts in his seat a bit. “That culture week thing? We’ve made sure nothing’s going to ruin it.”

“That’s great,” Barry murmurs, his focus now fully on the movie. If the guys at work asked him for a witness statement now, he couldn’t have repeated what Len said. 

Len’s arm tightens around him, and Barry drops his head onto his shoulder. This is as good as it gets. Nothing could spoil it.

* * *

On Saturday morning, Iris arrives at Barry’s apartment, as she does most Saturdays. She tuts at his unlocked door, but walks right in anyway. “Barry?”

“In here,” his voice calls back from the kitchen.

She finds him at the sink. “Surprised to see you here,” she says. “Heard you had a _date.”_ She lets her voice linger on the last word, raising her eyebrows.

He throws her a dish towel and makes a face at her. “You sound like we’re still in tenth grade.” He nods at the pile of wet dishes that he’s working through. “My dishwasher broke down. Make yourself useful.”

“Again?” She leans against the counter so she can look at him. “I’ll help if we can gossip.”

He grins at her as he scrubs a plate. “Not much to tell, really. Movie night was good.” He smiles, a little absently. “I might ask Len if he wants to do something in the week. He’s so organized. I think he could stand to be a little more spontaneous sometimes, you know?”

His voice still takes on a dreamy quality when he talks about that guy he’s dating. Iris smiles at him. “Might be a losing battle, from what you’ve told me about him—but if anyone can help make him more impulsive, it’d be you, Barry Allen.” She reaches down to grab a cup from the pile of wet dishes. “You’re cute together.” 

“Do you like him?” he says to the sink, clearly trying to pretend it’s just an idle question.

He’s rinsing a wine glass, deep in thought. Iris has figured out that this guy is special to Barry, but maybe it’s getting serious. The question deserves a serious answer, if it is. “I don’t really know him,” she admits. “We’ve met, what, one and a half times? Which by the way, only _you_ can do anything about.” She sticks her tongue out at Barry. 

He frowns. “What was the half?”

“At the door to his place, that time I picked you up.” The other time was a proper meeting, when Iris joined them for lunch in a quiet little independent cafe on the outskirts of town. Len had said something about this place not mixing up anyone’s drinks. He’d been charming. A little mysterious, but sweet to her. Sweeter to Barry. 

Barry has fallen quiet, his eyes distant at the kitchen window. Iris clarifies, “I like what I’ve seen of him. I like how he makes you happy.”

She means it. There’s almost nothing she likes more. Her best friend has been through enough—all of them on Team Flash have, but especially Barry. He deserves a little happiness, after everything.

The delighted smile he gives her in reply is more than enough reward for her sincere answer.

* * *

Early on Monday morning, Len is seriously regretting having crashed at the safe house after their late night of planning, as the familiar noise of an argument starts up. Discerning that the raised voices belong to Hartley and Axel, he shoves the pillow over his head.

After a minute of flailing around in bed, he sighs and drags himself up.

“What was that commotion about?” he asks Mick, who’s frying eggs in the kitchen.

Mick shrugs at the stove. “Trickster and Piper. Can never tell if they’re fucking or fighting.”

Len arches an eyebrow, though no one is watching to appreciate the dramatic effect. “Don’t know which is worse.”

Mick just grunts in agreement. “Everything set for tonight?”

There’s a reason Len’s worked with Mick for years. His single-mindedness may get a bit intense, but it can be useful. “Yup,” Len confirms, sitting down at the table and accepting the plate of eggs. “Seven o’clock sharp. _Incident_ at the waterfront. The Flash is gonna run right into it. And then he won’t be doing any more running for a while.” 

Mick raises his eyebrows.

Len stops chewing. “What?”

“Just thought you might need a minute for an evil villain laugh there.”

Trying not to smile, Len takes another bite of eggs. “Then tomorrow we hit the auction house. No distractions, no leather-clad menace to get in our way.”

Mick’s pleased hum is music to Len’s ears. Unlike the shouting that starts up again on the other side of the warehouse. He drops his head on the table. “Can I just freeze them both?”

His partner claps him on the back. “No. Eat your eggs.”

As Len settles back to do just that, his phone buzzes. He picks it up.

“Why are you smiling?” Mick demands.

Len aims a stony look at him. “Because my _boyfriend_ is cute. Got a problem with that?”

Mick cringes. Len smirks. Irritating his partner with the b-word is the most fun he’s had in ages.

Mick’s lips twitch, just slightly. “Whatever, Boss. Don’t get jizz on the chair.”

Len flips him the bird, eyes back on his phone. When did he let himself get distracted by the ridiculousness that is Barry Allen? Part of him wants to scoff at the plans Barry has just suggested for their evening. Another part thinks it’s the cutest shit he’s ever heard. 

For once, Len’s even free to hang out. The Rogues will be done with the Flash stuff by nine o’clock. He answers Barry’s text. Then he shoves his phone into a pocket, shaking his head at himself. He’s going soft on the guy, and he doesn’t even care.

* * *

On Monday morning, Barry wakes up to sunlight streaming in through the gaps in his ratty curtains. 

He eats breakfast in his courtyard garden, watching blackbirds soaring through the clear sky, speckled with one or two fluffy clouds. Barry sips his coffee, pondering again whether to ask Len if he wants to meet up tonight. 

He spends a few minutes arguing with himself in his head about it. All his usual crap. _You just saw him, Barry. You’re too clingy, Barry. Why would he want to spend all his time with you, Barry?_ But eventually even his judgy internal commentary agrees that it’s too good an idea to pass up, and he fires off a text.

_It’s gonna be a lovely night. Want to meet somewhere we can gaze at the moon? Same place as last time._

The wait for a reply is heavy with the ache of eternity, but at last his phone buzzes in his pocket. 

_Lenny: You’re adorable._

Barry grins.

_Lenny: I have a thing till about 9 PM. Can you make it a late one?_

Barry’s face is aching from all the smiling he can’t seem to stop doing. 

_I sure can._

His hand hovers over the keypad again, confidence rising into unmapped reaches, after Len’s positive reply. He thinks about telling him…

He pockets his phone, reminding himself that a text message is not a good way to say that, when Len hasn’t said it back yet. 

But maybe tonight.

As he ambles off to get ready for Flash business, he’s echoing something Len was singing the other morning. _“The way you haunt my dreams,”_ he sings, almost under his breath. _“No, no, they can’t take that away from me...”_

* * *

At seven o’clock that evening, Cisco picks up a blast from the cold gun down by the docks.

“This better not make me late for my date,” Barry complains as he suits up, ignoring Cisco’s sigh down the comms as he starts running.

When he’s almost at the docks, his comms shut off.

“Cisco?” he calls out as he runs, tapping the side of his head. Nothing. 

But worse things have happened in the field, and Barry is here now. He’ll just check it out, and go straight back to STAR Labs if anything looks weird.

Skidding to a soggy stop at the edge of the pier, he scans the row of warehouses, where just a few moments ago Cisco identified the cold gun in use. Now, everything is dark. No Rogues. No anyone.

“I’m going in for a closer— oh, dammit.” Being comm-less is a nightmare for his speed-fuelled need to talk his way through a combat situation. 

Something prickles across the back of his neck as he moves towards the third warehouse. It’s probably just anxiety, but it makes him slow down. His lightning trail might draw attention from...

Who? There’s no one here.

He gears up to flash his way through the warehouses, but he—can’t.

Again, he strains his muscles to run, reaching out for the Speed Force, that enigmatic, limitless power that never fails him. 

Not even a spark of lightning. He can’t vibrate a hand, much less run.

He reaches a maddeningly slow hand up to his comms. “Team Flash, are you there?” 

Static buzzes in his ear.

“No one is coming to help you, Flash,” an unfamiliar female voice says... in his head. 

Barry tries to force himself to turn around, but he can’t. Every muscle is shaking against an invisible force that won’t let him run. He’s trapped. 

“What—” he gasps through clenched teeth and caged lungs. The word barely makes it out. 

He can’t _move._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to blueelvewithwings for beta reading and content chat, and to RetroactiveCon for chatting over plot points with me.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team at STAR Labs have no leads for finding the kidnapped Barry, but they do manage to figure out who his boyfriend is. It could turn out to be relevant...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter ends on a bit of an unresolved cliffhanger, so I’m aiming to post the next one in a few days, if I can, to ease the pain! Fair warning of whump and some angst - same goes for the next chapter. (This chapter not beta read - please forgive any errors.)

There’s a man striding towards Barry. His long dirty-blond hair is pulled back into a single braid running down his back, a nondescript black jumpsuit showing off every powerful muscle. He moves almost like Sara Lance, coiled tight with the potential energy of barely repressed violence. 

He stops close enough to touch Barry—who tries to flinch away, but he still can’t _move._ As the stranger looms over Barry, he can smell the alcohol on his breath. “Aww. Poor Flash.”

If Barry had enough power over his own body right now, he’d be shuddering.

The man grabs Barry’s wrist in a bruise-hard grip. “You can call me Ghoul.” Leering, he adds, “Not that you’ll be saying much of anything soon. Well, maybe the occasional ‘help me’.” 

Barry is struggling against invisible bonds, grasping feebly for the Speed Force, that miracle that has only ever left him when he’s done something awful to deserve it. And maybe he has, because now there’s barely a spark left to reach out for. His breath is coming in tight, desperate little gasps. His lungs feel like they’re caged in iron.

Ghoul releases Barry’s wrist and his arm flops useless at his side. “He’s immobilised, my dear,” he calls out. “Your turn.” 

The woman who emerges from the warehouse is as beautiful as the man, and walks like she’s twice as deadly. “Well, look at this,” she crows, and Barry tries to wince at the voice that forced itself into his _mind_ a moment ago _._ “We caught ourselves a lightning demon.” She gives him a poisonous smile. “We’re all going to have so much fun.” 

And she snaps her fingers. 

Barry’s world erupts in a white-hot blaze of agony.

* * *

The Rogues’ trap for the Flash springs exactly as planned. So, at nine o’clock, Len is right on time for his impromptu picnic date with Barry. Sometimes everything just works out too perfectly, he thinks, enjoying the well-earned satisfaction as he parks his bike on the edge of the lake shore.

The moon is rising over the water, thin light flickering over a glassy surface. With a sharp eye, Len selects the perfect spot, far from the last evening walkers, and spreads his blanket. Then he settles himself down to wait for his— for Barry.

At first the romance of the setting keeps him going. Then the thrill of waiting. But now, under the thin light of a nearly-full moon, Len stares down at the two full glasses of champagne at his feet, gone flat, beside the picnic basket. Untouched under the checked cover are Barry’s favorite peanut butter sandwiches and a home-baked chocolate cake. They’ll be warm and soggy now.

He pulls out his phone again, but the screen is still blank. He sends another text, just in case. 

Barry’s late for a lot of things, but he always turns up eventually.

When the hands on his watch hit eleven o’clock, Len pours away the champagne. It dribbles away over the rocks, fizzing and dying, little rivulets flowing out like blood towards the water.

Then he lies back, pebbles digging into his side. He can wait a little longer. 

_“The way you hold your knife,”_ he finds himself humming. _“The way we danced till three…”_

He stares up into the almost starless Central City sky, wondering when he fell in love, and why it’s taken him this long to notice.

* * *

Barry fades in and out.

For the first couple of hours, there’s just unrelenting pain. No one’s laid a hand on him, but it’s like they’re tearing his mind open, and _oh God_ it hurts. But he’s never awake for long, always dropping back down into the blank relief of darkness.

He has moments of lucid respite, when his captors are taking breaks between— whatever these attacks are. Then he squints up at dazzling lights, trying to figure out where he is. Fighting to raise his head, he pulls on handcuffs, clinking against a pipe. Hulks of brown and metal rise in uneven shapes around him. 

Okay, so they’ve moved him. An abandoned factory, maybe? He fights the wave of despair threatening to drown him. Does his team have the first clue where he is?

As soon as he’s done with his coffee, Ghoul gets right back to breaking Barry’s head open. He doesn’t know how to fight this. He struggles to stay awake, but it’s like swimming upwards through water with a hand closing around his ankle, dragging him back down into the dark.

* * *

As soon as Barry’s comms go out, Cisco starts to panic.

With every hour that goes by, the worse it gets. The team’s stress feeds into his. They retrace Barry’s steps, assembling scant clues like a puzzle with missing pieces. All the arguing is giving Cisco a headache.

And still nothing from Barry.

At last, Wally speeds back in, bracing himself on the desk while he catches his breath. “He’s not at the docks. No sign of the Rogues there, either. I searched every warehouse and most of the city. He’s just… gone.”

Iris is the first to say what they’re all thinking. “Guys, it’s been five hours. What if he was fighting someone who—” She swallows. “What if they’ve neutralized his powers?”

Joe’s hand lingers on his gun. “We gotta get CCPD on the case.” 

“Oh, right, because _they_ can help,” Caitlin snaps. She’s wound tight, bustling around like she has something medical to do. She doesn’t.

“We got meta specialists,” Joe says, then goes silent at her glowing white eyes.

Harry, who has breached in from Earth-2 for the emergency—because Cisco is _useless_ and out of ideas—jabs at Cisco’s computer screen. “Why can’t you vibe him?” 

Shoving him away, Cisco waves at Barry’s jacket folded on the desk. “I’ve tried. Something’s blocking me. Or _someone_.” 

Everyone starts talking at once.

Cisco slams his hand down on the desk in front of him. “HEY!” 

They stop talking to look at him expectantly. It doesn’t help. He drops his aching head onto the desk. “We don’t have a single clue to follow, do we?”

“We have to assume he’s been kidnapped.” Harry’s voice is never exactly sedate, but somehow it always manages to calm him down.

Cisco nods against the cool surface of the desk. It’s the best idea they’ve had yet. “We need to—I don’t know—track down someone well-connected. Someone who knows the criminal element of Central City. The metahuman black market, maybe.”

Iris is on the other side of the room, and he nearly misses what she says. “We should retrace his movements again. Maybe start earlier in the day. He said he had a date with Len…”

The connection hits Cisco like a derailed train, slamming into him out of nowhere. But that’s not quite true, is it? Cisco has been putting two and two together for a while now, kept coming up with what looked like seven, but suddenly it feels _exactly_ like four. 

He raises a hand, and waits for them all to shut up again. “I’m getting,” he says quietly, “a really terrible idea.”

* * *

When Barry wakes again, he’s curled up on the floor, with a bored-looking Ghoul sitting opposite him. He struggles to sit up, pulling at his cuffs. A shot of pain through his side—he collapses again. There’s something wrong with his brain. It’s fuzzy round the edges… 

“Ah, good,” Ghoul says cheerfully. “You’re up. You wouldn’t believe how long it took to get your attention.” He points behind him, at the woman lounging on a piece of equipment behind him, staring up into the ceiling. “There are a few side effects when Psyche sends someone to sleep. Hopefully you won’t end up with brain damage, but I can’t promise anything.” He grins. “I’m sure you’re just dying to know how we stopped your speed in its, heh, tracks.” 

Barry spits blood—has he bitten his tongue? “My team are looking for me,” he slurs. “You won’t… uh…” He falters, words lost in the fog again.

Behind Ghoul, Psyche laughs. “We won’t _what,_ little speedster? Get away with it? Oh, please say it. You’re too cute.”

Ghoul lifts a hand. A shot of fear-fuelled adrenaline runs through Barry. “What are you doing to me?” he snarls.

“I’ll show you.” Ghoul shoots a chilling smile over his shoulder at Psyche. “I think we’re getting better at this all the time.”

Barry gasps. Pulls his knees up to his chest. “What— _No—”_

Ghoul shouldn’t be able to touch his link to the Speed Force, but that’s just what it feels like he’s doing. He’s tearing at the edges of it, pulling Barry away from the lightning, like he’s ripping a bloody bandage off a wound.

Barry screams.

* * *

While everyone is arguing about the truly terrible idea that is Cisco’s plan, Iris slips out. She ends up on the floor of a hallway with her back against the wall, hands shoved in the pockets of her jeans to keep from biting her nails.

Cisco follows her out, leaning back against the opposite wall. “Hey.” He glances back towards the Cortex. “You missed a bit of an argument there,” he deadpans.

She’s pretty sure he’s gone off the deep end, but if he’s serious, she wants to understand. “You really want to call _Captain Cold?_ I know he’s not the worst of Barry’s villains, but he’s hardly a friend.”

He shrugs. “You got a better idea? His cold gun was the last thing we saw at the docks before Barry disappeared. And he’s a criminal mastermind—got connections with all the black market networks in this town. If he doesn't know who’s abducted Barry, he can find out.” 

“And what if the Rogues are the ones who took him?” 

“I don’t think they are.” He sounds oddly sure about that.

He can’t look at her. There’s something he’s not telling her. “How do you even have his number?” she tries.

He glances away, biting at his bottom lip. “I don’t. I have Golden Glider’s, from that time we helped her.” 

She sighs. Back then, Cisco was hardly Golden Glider’s biggest advocate, when the Rogue came to them for help, but he melted. It helped that she was into him. Maybe that’s all this is about, but something still doesn’t add up. Cisco is almost no better with secrets than Barry, and Iris can see him squirming his way through a dilemma now, his face tight and conflicted. “Why would he help us?” She raps her hands on the metal surface behind her with a _ding._ “What do you know?”

He just stares at the wall where it curves around the corner, like he’s thinking about letting it slide open and disappearing into the time vault. 

“Cisco, we have no leads.” She hears her voice break, and she doesn’t care who else hears it. “Please.”

Raising guilty eyes to the ceiling, he says, “I don’t know anything for sure. I just did a bit of digging. And then I found out some things, and then I stopped looking, ‘cause _he_ didn’t want to know, and I didn’t want to know something he—”

“Cisco,” she interrupts. She loves them all, but she’s so done with this team and its secrets that could mean Barry’s life or death.

He lets out a long, resigned sigh. “I think Captain Cold might be Leonard Snart.”

Iris half-pushes off the wall. “Leonard Snart as in _Len?_ Barry’s boyfriend?”

“Yup.”

She lets her head fall back against the metal wall again. “Oh, God.”

* * *

Len’s aching eyes slide from the blueprints to the tourist guide to the Central City auction house, with its little attached museum. He scans the text again, as if it holds the answers to all his problems. CULTURE WEEK! RENOIR EXHIBITION: WEDNESDAY ONLY.

His treacherous gaze slips back to his blank phone screen. 

He forces it onto the blueprints again. His was-he-ever boyfriend may have ghosted him, but the fifteen million dollar take is still waiting for him at the museum. Len is well aware that he doesn’t deserve anything good, but this, at least, he knows how to make his own. Unlike Barry.

“I’m going to bed,” Mick announces, dragging himself up from the chair opposite. “You should too.”

“Fuck off,” Len murmurs.

“Fine. Fall asleep tomorrow on our biggest job in years.” Mick continues snarking all the way to the door of his room. “Get arrested. Just don’t take me down with you.”

Len’s too far past caring about anything to snap back at him. He drops his head onto the table. He’s vaguely aware that a phone is ringing somewhere, but he can sleep through that.

From her seat at the window on the other side of the long room, Lisa sing-songs, “It’s for yoo-ou.”

“What?” Len drags his head up, glancing at the clock. It’s late—early—for a phone call. His finely-tuned internal warning system is unhappy about something, but he’s too tired to work out what. 

“STAR Labs,” Lisa says. The look on her face is oddly gleeful. 

It takes him a beat to understand what she’s saying. He stands up. He very nearly doesn’t accept the phone, but she just keeps shoving it at him. 

_“Captain Cold?”_ says a voice that Len is pretty sure belongs to that little friend of Barry’s, and something jolts inside him. 

“Who’s asking?” he answers, before his sluggish brain realises what a mistake that was.

_“This is Cisco Ramon from STAR Labs.”_

STAR Labs… The Rogues learned the significance of that place when the Flash helped Lisa once, though she stayed tight-lipped about most of it. Len figured they’d made some kind of a deal with her. He could respect that. Now, through his sleepy haze, he’s trying to grasp the connection between the Flash’s little hero team and Barry’s friend. There’s another shoe still waiting to drop.

In a much less sure tone, Ramon adds, _“…Leonard Snart?”_

Len is in a dangerous line of work. He’s been shot more than once. He viscerally remembers the first reaction to a bullet wound, that shockwave of numb cold running from head to foot. This is worse. 

Keeping his people’s identity safe from the goddamn good guys has been Len’s singular motivation for a long time now. He’s been tiring of the vicious cat-and-mouse game he can never win. The heroes can keep raising the stakes forever, keep getting better, stronger, _faster._ He can’t. Sooner or later, they were always going to call his bluff.

_I fold._

He sinks back down into his chair. “What do you want?”

“We need to talk.”

“Do we?” he drawls. Even without the voice altering tech he’s used in the field since the beginning, he knows how to do an intimidating Captain Cold.

“Yeah,” Ramon replies, his shaky voice getting bolder. “The Flash has been kidnapped. _Barry’s_ been kidnapped. We need your help.”

* * *

Standing over Barry, Ghoul regards him calmly, a hand primed above his head. “No doubt you’ve figured out by now that my lovely wife and I are both psychic. We specialize in controlling metas’ powers. Never tried with a speedster, but there’s a first time for everything.” Ghoul’s smile is weird. Too wide for his face—or maybe that’s just Barry starting to hallucinate. “There are people ready to pay good money for you, if we can figure out that little _quirk_ of yours. Don’t fight, and it’ll be easier on you.”

Barry kicks out. His foot connects hard with Ghoul’s shin.

Ghoul hisses and grabs Barry by the wrist, hauling him up. Barry’s arm scrapes up the pipe with a clang of the cuffs. “Fine. We’ll keep doing this the painful way, then.” Rage pools in Barry’s stomach at the guy’s smug face. “You do know why you’re here, don’t you, Flash?”

Barry can only blink up at him, cursing how _slow_ he is… 

“Those Rogues you’re so friendly with? They sold you out.”

The revelation is less dramatic than Ghoul probably intends. Barry could have guessed that one of his enemies arranged for his kidnapping. “Okay?” he rasps.

Ghoul grins like he does when he’s really taking his time digging into Barry’s mind. “We’re psychics, Flash. We don’t do a deal without taking a little tour in our partners’ heads. A few days ago, I had a little poke around the rather interesting mind of one Captain Cold. And now I’ve had a poke around yours.” His voice drops to a delighted murmur. “You have a very charming boyfriend, Barry Allen.”

A rush of irritation drowns out Barry’s fear. What’s Len got to do with anything? “Boyfriend?” 

Ghoul’s mean grin widens. “You’re a little slow on the uptake, Flash.” He pats Barry on the shoulder, ignoring his flinch away. “Leonard Snart? He _is_ Captain Cold.”

It’s the last twist of a knife in Barry’s gut.

And then Ghoul drops him, turns around and walks away, leaving him alone and broken on the floor.

* * *

The rest of the phone conversation is a blur. Len only remembers highlights.

_You’ve got your wires crossed, kid._

_There’s no time for your lies, Snart, so let’s just skip right past them and get to the point. Barry’s the Flash. The Flash has disappeared. You’re as invested in this situation as we are. Help us._

Under the window, Len squints into the rising sunlight. One phrase echoes, over and over, after he hangs up the phone.

_Barry’s the Flash._

And Captain Cold just handed him over to psychics who torture the powers out of metahumans.

 _Slowly,_ the psychics said. 

_That sounds perfect,_ Cold said.

What the hell has he done?

Len looks up into the expectant faces of Lisa and Mick. Now is not the time to give the game away—not until there’s a plan. So he focuses on the only thing he can process. “Well, STAR Labs know who I am.” He’s expecting angry protests, but there’s only confused silence. He shakes his head at the ceiling. “Please could someone slap me upside the head?”

Lisa obliges.

“Thank you.” Len gets up, grabbing his coat, reaching for his gun and strapping it to his thigh. He shoves down the inconvenient reactions trying to push their way up to the surface. _Not now._ If he thinks about it for a second, he’ll fall apart.

He’s Captain Cold. He does not fall apart.

“The hell?” Mick is in the doorway, blocking his way. “Where are you going?”

Len tries to push past him. “STAR Labs.” 

“Alone?” Mick asks, looking at Len like he’s just proposed walking into the lion enclosure at the zoo and putting his head between the jaws of the biggest one.

“They need my help,” Len snarls. They’re not going to keep him from— 

_Barry._

Standing his ground, Mick demands, “What if it’s a trap?”

Len hears a dry, ugly sound bubble out of his own mouth. It could barely be described as a laugh. “I don’t care.”

Behind him, Lisa’s cough is unimpressed. “What about the _job,_ Lenny?”

“Fuck the job,” he says.

And walks away before they can change his mind.

* * *

It’s dark outside when they finally leave Barry alone. He’s too disorientated to guess at the time. Even bad guys with a torture kink need to sleep, he supposes. 

They chain him to the pipe with the meta cuffs. Then they turn off the lights and lock him into the room. He assumes they’ve left someone standing guard, but he can’t see anyone left in the room with him. But it’s not like it matters. His limbs feel like lead. The whole of his side is throbbing. Escape is the last thing on his mind.

He can’t believe what is on his mind. After all this, everything he’s been through, everything he knows, that ridiculous thought still won’t go away.

_Len will save me._

The cruel irony is too much for Barry. He’s somehow kept it together—more or less—for the whole of this interminable day, but he can’t anymore. There’s no one here he needs to be strong for. There’s no one here to be the Flash for. 

Barry drops his head to his knees and sobs.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If he’s going to pull off this rescue, Len’s going to need a little bit of help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another whumpy chapter, but with a rescue at the end. After this there’s only one more chapter of unrelenting angst, before things will start to look up for everyone... slowly!
> 
> Thanks to blueelvewithwings for excellent beta reading.

The facilities at STAR Labs are as impressive as Len imagined, but he’s not exactly getting the full tour. He’s standing in the middle of the Cortex, with seven sets of accusing eyes turned on him. 

His grip tightens around the cold gun.

“I’m watching you, _Captain Cold,”_ Ramon snaps. Len restrains the urge to tell him he hadn’t noticed. “You’re not stealing any more of my tech.”

“Please,” Len drawls. “That was one time.” 

The joke doesn’t land.

“Why are we letting him be here?” Joe West says, waving a finger at Len, his other hand dangerously close to his own gun. This probably isn’t the ideal time for Len to meet Barry’s foster father. Maybe if they’d encountered each other in a less tense setting, West would be looking at him like his son’s partner, and not like a killer. 

Still, it’s no less than Len deserves.

“Because he’s going to help us,” is Ramon’s moody reply.

The good guys actually waste their time debating the ethics of working with Len. It leaves his fists itching to strike out. He rolls his eyes instead, making sure every petty little member of Team Flash sees it. This is the well-organized crew that defeated the Rogues, foiled the plans of an actual professional, time after time? Len’s almost embarrassed. If he hadn’t seen the Flash—Barry—in action, he would be.

While they’re all busy with their _vital_ ethical discussion, he steps towards the far wall. The mannequin is built to the dimensions of Barry’s long, graceful runner’s frame. Len reaches out to trace the familiar lines of his boyfriend’s arm, the bump of muscle, the lithe curve of a shoulder. This is clearly where the Flash suit hangs, at the center of the team’s world, inspiring their heroics. Len should find it ridiculous. But all he can see is that it’s empty. 

Something in his sternum jerks in, forcing a double hitch in his breath. It hurts.

“Hi,” says a quiet voice beside him, and he turns his head just enough to glance at the person Barry trusts more than anyone else in the world, Len included.

But then, Barry should never have trusted _him._

He turns back to the mannequin. “Hello, Iris.”

“Are you going to help us?” Her flat, hopeless note resonates with the gaping chasm inside him.

He spins around on one heel. “I am.” He doesn’t even have to pause to think about it, and seriously, what the hell has Barry Allen done to him?

Iris smiles, and there’s just more of that misguided trust in her eyes.

_Oh, hell._

He takes a measured breath that fails to steady him. This is about to go very badly for him. That doesn’t seem to matter anymore. “But first, there’s something you should know.”

* * *

Len expects the STAR Labs team to need their angry moment, but he only has so much patience.

He waits till the accusations start dying down a bit, then he raises a bored voice. “You done?” Half a dozen outraged faces glare back at him. “‘Cause I’m pretty sure we don’t have time to yell at me _and_ rescue Barry. So if it’s all the same with you heroes, I vote for rescuing my boyfriend.”

“We’ll see if he’s still _that_ when we get him back,” says a sullen West. Under his breath, he adds, “He can do better than you.”

The ache in Len’s jaw tells him he’s biting down hard, but he forces himself not to snap back. Probably best if he tries not to hate Barry’s foster father. 

Especially when West is right.

As far as he can, Len tells them what they need to know. He tries not to linger on the powers of the psychics who’ve taken Barry—

_Not taken. Sold out. Betrayed._

He doesn’t mention that they’re sadistic bastards. The things they like to do to their victims. How that was all part of the deal. 

Cisco’s voice fades in and out, like someone’s tuning a radio. “But you don’t know where they took him?” Len shakes his head. The Cortex walls are closing in on him.

He just barely makes it out to the hall and around a bend before the world spins. He ends up on the floor, slumped against an unyielding metal wall.

It’s a while before a figure appears at his elbow, dropping down beside him. “You know, there are comfier seats in the lounge.”

This is going to suck, but he deserves whatever he gets. He breathes through the nausea, in and out, before inclining his head to her. “Ms West.” Maybe he shouldn’t get first name privileges just now.

She doesn’t correct him. “Why are you here, Leonard?”

“To help him.” 

She’s watching him through canny eyes. “Do you ever tell the truth?”

Damn. She’s bold. He doesn’t mean to stare at her—glances away as soon as he realises he is. “Not often.”

She scoots around till she’s opposite him, legs criss-crossed in front of her. “I need the truth now, Leonard.” 

_I fold._ “Okay.”

“Did you know Barry was the Flash?”

Len’s been wondering which of their little team would be brave enough to ask that first. He could have put money on Iris. “I had no fucking clue.” She raises skeptical eyebrows, and he has no idea why, but it’s suddenly the most important thing in the world that she believes him. “Did I know there was something weird going on with him? Sure. Guy keeps strange hours. Goes off the grid. He’s late for _everything.“_ His eyes drift to the ceiling, the same sterile gray metal as the floor, and he snorts. “Thought he might be into something less than legal, at first—you believe that? And then I got to know him.” 

At movie nights, Barry wincing his way through the Star Wars prequels, because Len likes them. At moonlit picnics, Barry arriving with a shopping bag full of Len’s favorite wine that he’d schlepped to six different stores to find. Over breakfast, when all Len had done was toss a few pancakes, and Barry would look at him like he was important. 

Barry Allen was always too good for him. 

He lets out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. “Barry’s a lot of things. Criminal ain’t one of them.” 

“Okay,” she says, with only the hint of a crack in her voice. “Then I can trust you to help get him back safely.” 

Len’s briefly impressed by this woman. No wonder Barry cares about her. He nods, taking in her tear-filled eyes. Swallows down the damn lump in his own throat, distracting himself playing with the zipper on his coat. “You got every right to hate me, Iris.”

“Probably,” she says softly, “but I don’t.”

A surge of rage spikes inside him, and maybe he should be worried about how his once-tight control is spinning away from him. He hisses, “You _should.”_

“I don’t think you’re really talking about me,” she says, with a perceptive half smile.

Safely hidden away in the pockets of his parka, his hands shake. She’s right—Barry is the one who should hate Len. And he should never come near anyone as dangerous as Len _ever_ again. If Len has to make sure of that himself, he will.

His mind swerves away from that. Right now, he just needs Barry _here._ Better home safe and hating Len, than…

“Iris.” Ramon’s voice echoes over some kind of intercom. “We’re putting a plan together. We could, uh, use Snart’s help with it.” 

Any other time, Len would have laughed at the loathing in Cisco’s voice. Now it’s just another reminder that he’s not worth anything else.

A narrow-eyed Iris gets up, offering Len her hand. “We’re going to find him, Leonard.”

With this team, she’s probably right. It’s what comes after that scares him.

Len takes her hand and lets her help him up, and they walk back to the Cortex together like old friends.

* * *

Barry’s throat is so dry, it hurts to breathe.

At first, he thought they’d at least want to keep him alive. But grim reality has set in now. They’ve given him nothing to eat and barely anything to drink. They don’t care if he dies. 

Psyche and Ghoul may be meta black market traders, but he doesn’t think they care much about selling him on. They’re doing all this to him for practice. For _fun._

For brief moments, he can still feel the muted lightning of the Speed Force sparking through him. That means they haven’t been able to remove his powers permanently—yet. 

“Again,” Psyche says, arms folded as she lounges back against the desk. She’s starting to look bored. 

What happens to Barry when they stop having fun?

He struggles to his feet, restraints clattering up the long pipe behind him. He manages a weak, “Please…” before a hand smacks across his face. It’s just one more flare of pain, but it drops him to his knees. 

And Ghoul rips into his head again.

* * *

The team makes their plans around him. Len answers questions, throws out better ideas than most of them, but he’s broken. Ripped open with all his guts spilling out, and his own hand was holding the knife all along.

But Barry doesn’t have time for this shit. So Len shoves it all into the box inside him where he keeps his distractions, and gets on with the job. And that’s all it is—another job. They’re just relieving a couple of merchants of their goods. He has to keep it that simple, or his goddamn _feelings_ are going to get Barry killed.

He refuses to follow down the dark roads where that thought leads.

When Len tires of the science bullshit, he lifts his voice over the drone of the discussion. “We’re running out of time.” 

No one pays him any attention. 

It’s a lot like a meeting of the Rogues. Rolling his eyes like he would if Mick and Axel were the ones not listening, he steps slowly into the middle of the Cortex. “SHUT. THE HELL. UP.”

He wasn’t expecting them to do it. Okay. They called his bluff, now he’ll call theirs.

“Like I _said,_ we’re running out of time. Let’s get to the point.” He hops up onto the edge of the console, aiming to project an air of boredom. “We’re dealing with psychics who can incapacitate metahumans. Ramon, your toys ain’t gonna cut it. We don’t know enough about how they do what they do.” He accepts Cisco’s silence as assent. Then he takes a breath and jumps right in. “There’s only one solution here. Send in a team of non-metahumans to get Barry.” He meets Ramon’s eye. “That _is_ the other reason you wanted me here, isn’t it?”

The engineer nods at him.

Len folds his arms across his chest, enjoying the feeling of the smirk rising on his face. “Then do I have the solution for you. _Please_ can we skip the inevitable sniping, and jump to the part where you all accept it’s a good idea?”

West looks between Len and Cisco. “What’s he mean?” 

On the other side of the computer bank, Iris’s eyes are oddly bright at Len. “He’s bringing in the other Rogues.” She reaches over to pat her father on the arm. “Don’t make a scene, Dad. There’s no time.”

Len shrugs. “She’s right. There is not.” Jumping up from his perch on the desk, he pulls his gun at the wall. The whirr is just familiar enough to ground him. It’s the sound of power—control. “The biggest challenge is gonna be finding him. Before it’s _too late._ ” 

“Can you help Wally and me narrow down a list of locations?” Jesse asks.

He powers the gun down again, letting it drop to his side, and nods at her. “Something tells me my crew are gonna be harder to persuade than you heroes.” He takes a moment to smirk at the detective. “Grand tour of this place might help persuade them.”

“Oh, God,” West says. 

Iris just keeps patting him on the shoulder.

* * *

Len meets them at the elevator. He’s almost impressed that Team Flash have kept their word and left him alone to talk to the Rogues, even if they must have cameras trained on him.

The doors open to reveal a masked Lisa at the front, shielding a sullen-looking Mick behind her. 

Len raises an eyebrow. “And where are the others?” 

Lisa steps out, her eyes glinting with curiosity at the surroundings. “Boo was too freaked out to come. But she’s useless anyway, if you’re right about the metahuman thing. I think Piper could be persuaded to help with tech, but—same problem.” She shrugs. “Weather Wizard wouldn’t come near this place even if he wasn’t a meta, and Axel’s MIA. This is it.”

“Three of us, huh?” With their guns, that’s almost fair odds, if they can get intel on vulnerabilities and weaknesses. Len’s good at that. Barry might say he’s a little too good.

He shoves that thought away with all the others.

Lisa’s nervous eyes glance up towards the CCTV camera. Then she looks back at him, waiting.

When they were growing up, Lisa had this habit. She’d look at Len before answering their father. Lewis would speak with the voice of a tyrant, and Lisa would look to her brother, waiting for his word. _Do what Dad says, Lisa,_ he’d bite out in reply. And she’d shrug and do it—eat her breakfast, turn off the TV, apologize to her father, get behind the wheel of the getaway van. Trusting it was safe, because Lenny told her it was. She hasn’t done that in years. 

He knows what he’s about to ask her to do, and he’s going to do it anyway.

“What’s the deal, Lenny?” she asks softly.

“Amnesty,” he says. “Flash and his team don’t touch us, once they know who we are.”

Mick’s voice is a quiet, dangerous rumble. “Once they _what?”_

Len raises a hand. “That’s the deal. We unmask ourselves, so they know they can trust us.”

“And you think you can trust _them?”_ Lisa snaps.

“I have to.”

She pauses, gazing at him. “God, you’re really gone on this one, aren’t you, Lenny?” She giggles. “So, not only is he a cop—”

“He’s not a cop,” Len snaps back. It’s an old argument.

“—Not only is he a cop, but he’s the Flash, too?” She reaches over to pat him on the arm. “Oh, Lenny.”

He raises an eyebrow at her. “Are you done?”

She beams at him. “Can’t blame a girl for enjoying herself.” 

Mick turns around, walking a few paces away. He chuckles. “You’re damn right, he’s gone on this one.” He spins around to give Len the beady eye. “He really worth the risk?”

There’s no point pretending otherwise. If Len’s going to ask them to put their identities and safety on the line, they should know why. He meets his old friend’s gaze. “He is.”

Mick tilts his head at Lisa, obviously waiting for _someone’s_ direction.

“Fine,” she says at last. She points at her brother. “This had better not end up with us being screwed over, Lenny. You got that?” But she’s smiling, almost indulgently.

He offers her his hand with the intention of leading her to the Cortex. “I’m still perfectly capable of watching our backs, Lisa.”

She slaps his hand away. “We’ll see.” Pulling off her golden mask in one smooth motion, she grins triumphantly at the camera. “Hi!” she yells up at it. “Lisa Snart—if you hadn’t already guessed.” Then, only pausing to ask, “This way?” she starts marching towards the Cortex.

Len is shaking his head as he and Mick trail behind her.

Mick nods ahead at her. “That firecracker is mostly your fault.” 

And Len can’t really disagree with that.

* * *

“Again,” Psyche repeats, now sounding thoroughly bored.

Barry’s struggling to keep his eyes open, grasping for what little control he can still claw back. That’s how he catches sight of something moving, just beyond the tiny window to his left. It’s familiar…

A lightning trail. 

He could cry, but he doesn’t move. Just watches as Jesse stops, meets his eye, nods, and zips away again.

Psyche and Ghoul both have their eyes shut, digging deep into his mind. They didn’t see her.

He loses consciousness again for a while. When he comes to, Psyche and Ghoul are talking somewhere out of sight.

He shuts his eyes again.

“Why is it taking so long?” Psyche is asking.

“You can’t rush a craftsman, my dear,” comes the distracted voice of Ghoul. He doesn’t sound confident.

“You’ve never done this with a speedster,” she snaps back. “They have some kind of, like, weird mystical connection to their powers—did you even know that? I don’t think you can break through that. I don’t think you know how.” There’s a dull thud, like she’s thrown something. “You’ve got three more hours.”

“And then?”

Silence.

“Let’s take a break,” Ghoul says. “I’ll get us some coffee.”

“Good plan.” 

Ghoul doesn’t forget to cuff Barry back to the pipe before he leaves. Psyche just pulls up the chair and watches him.

“You don’t have to do this,” Barry rasps. “You’re better than this.” 

She laughs. 

He tries again, but he’s fading. “You could… let me go…”

“Honey, even if you do survive the next three hours, there won’t be enough of you left to let go.”

He’s too exhausted to argue. He just lets himself slip back down into the darkness.

* * *

There’s a dull pain deep in Len’s chest, and he doesn’t know if it’s physical or… not. It’s been too long. Who knows what the fuck they’ve done to Barry. Who knows if he’s even still alive.

When Jesse speeds into the Cortex yelling that she’s found his location, Len can’t feel relief. He can’t feel anything except that ache in his sternum. 

Jesse looks right at Len when she says, “There was no getting past that psychic anti-meta shielding they’ve got around the place—but I saw him. He’s alive. He knows we’re coming.”

She doesn’t say he’s okay.

The Rogues move out, and Len snaps into that focused mindset that gets him through all his jobs. He can do this. Focus on the only thing that matters—getting Barry out, alive and with his mind in one piece.

And after that… 

_After_ doesn’t matter.

* * *

Barry can’t scream anymore. He just endures it. And he’s starting to forget why.

He doesn’t know how to give them his powers. He wishes he did. 

Somehow, through the noise of the blaze roaring through his mind, he hears something.

Banging. 

Like a door being kicked in.

Then a whirring. 

Like the cold gun.

_The cold gun._

He feels Psyche leave his mind first. Then he hears the shouting. Battle noise, a fractured part of him thinks.

Ghoul… doesn’t let go. He strides towards Barry. Grabs his shoulder. “Your powers are mine, speedster,” he snarls, and starts _scraping_ layers off his mind.

Barry doesn’t have anything left to lose. Later, he’ll tell Joe he doesn’t know how he did it. All he knows is that he needs to fight.

Lightning sparks in his hands. In his head.

There’s screaming, again, but now it’s not coming from Barry.

Barely aware of the fight in the distance, Barry collapses to the floor beside a twitching Ghoul. 

Then there’s a voice. 

Barry could be dying, and he’d still know that drawl. 

“You _sadistic_ little fuck.” There’s another whirr of the cold gun, somewhere above Ghoul. “I’m gonna enjoy this.” 

“Don’t,” Barry whispers. “Please don’t shoot him.”

The dark curtain is dropping again, but he can feel arms around him, carefully lifting him. The last fading part of him wonders why Captain Cold would be so gentle. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the rescue...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This might hurt, but it's the last chapter of *unrelenting* angst, I promise! From here on, it's a slow upward climb. :)

Since the moment at the factory when he lifted Barry off the grimy floor, Len hasn’t let anyone else touch him. He carried him out to the van and curled up with him on the back seat for the whole of the ride home, squeezing Barry’s hand softly through half-conscious groans at every bend and bump. Now Len takes him in his arms up to the imposing STAR Labs front entrance. But he hesitates at the black double doors that could bar his way to Barry forever.

Caitlin is waiting there, beside a wheeled stretcher. When Len doesn’t move, she points at it, eyebrows raised.

Gently, Len lowers Barry down.

Then they’re gone. The doors hiss shut behind them.

Len restrains a snarl at a stab of hurt he doesn’t deserve to feel. He can’t blame them for keeping him apart from Barry, but he didn’t think even Team Flash would be so petty as to slam the door in his face.

It’s Iris who hangs back, frowning at the Rogues as if debating something. “Thank you for bringing him home,” she tells Len.

He inclines his head in her general direction.

“Come on,” she says. 

The Rogues shuffle awkwardly behind Len, who still doesn’t move. And it doesn’t make any sense, because he just spent hours in STAR Labs, planning and working with these people. But now it feels like Team Flash are his enemies again, and STAR Labs is a dangerous place.

“Nah,” Mick says behind him, turning and heading for the van. “I’m outta here.”

Len thinks about following him. Just jumping on his bike and riding away. 

Iris doesn’t look like she’s going to give up. “He, uh…” She chews on a lip. “He might want to see you.”

That thought has Len’s stomach doing a grim flip, but he can’t say no. It’s a glint of light, and Len moves towards it. He follows Iris into STAR Labs.

As they pass the Cortex, Len does a convincing act of not noticing when Cisco turns from the little Team Flash huddle to give him a death glare. Iris leads him on, to the lounge. There’s a silent ‘stay here’ in her raised eyebrows as she closes the door behind him. Being confined should piss him off, but he barely thinks about it. Predictably, they shook Lisa off somewhere on the way, but she’s clearly not the one Iris is worried about letting loose in the labs. Fair enough.

The big white couch is too inviting, and he gives in, curling up on it. He doesn’t even know how long it’s been since this mess started. Other than brief naps in the van, he doesn’t think he’s slept since that all-night planning session for the job… 

_The job._ It’s Thursday morning. Fifteen million dollars were waiting for him at that auction house, and he let it just disappear into the air. Didn’t even notice the Tuesday night deadline whooshing past him. Or maybe he did, and he didn’t care.

Even here, where the other side could do anything to him, Len’s passed out before he can fight the urge to sleep. 

He wakes to the last moonlight of the early morning, streaming in through the big doors. Testing them, he finds them unlocked, and chuckles at the naïveté of heroes. They open out to a balcony with a stunning view of the city. Whoever owns this place could make a killing. Instead, they let Team Flash sit on prime real estate, doing nothing but running around showing off. Making useless toys, like the cold gun. 

He leans forward across the railing, letting his eyes scan the cityscape beneath. Criminals are more familiar with the city at night than most people, and Len’s never known it this quiet. Central City stands silent as an accusation. Too late, he realises what he’s missing. 

The lightning trail, running its nightly vigil. 

He can’t see the city anymore. There’s only Barry, crumpled on the ground in a torn Flash suit, bruises splattered across the side of his jaw—

“Hey,” says a voice, close by. “Breathe, Lenny.”

He only complies because he trusts that voice. Lisa usually runs at the first sign of his panic attacks—not that he’s had a real one in years—leaving Mick to clean up the mess, but she’ll do. Her hand on his back helps bring him back to earth a bit.

“Shit,” he murmurs, turning back against the railings, letting them hold him up. He side-eyes her. “Sorry.”

Lisa kicks at the ground with a heel. “‘S okay. Uh, the doc says he’s doing better.”

Len just nods. There’s nothing to say to that. “What are you still doing here?”

She shrugs. “Mick took the van. And how could a girl pass up the chance to do a little exploring of this place?” 

Once, Len would have laughed at that. Now he just watches as she wiggles deft fingers at him, a mirror image of his own gesture. She used to do that every time she learned how to lift a wallet, swipe a watch, just by watching Len. Didn’t matter that he discouraged it. He kept trying to keep her out of his world, and all she wanted was to be just like her brother.

One way or another, Len ruins everything he touches.

Perceptive eyes are narrowing at him. She takes a step closer, huddling against the railings. “How much do you care about this guy, Lenny?”

He laughs into the sky. “I just got my crew together, unmasked them to the enemy, risked their safety to take them into a potentially deadly combat situation, all to rescue him. What do you think?”

“Damn,” she says, drawing the sound out. “You’re in love with him.”

Len looks back down over the city. “I fucked up, Lise.”

“Yeah, you did.” He turns his head sharply to look at her, and she grins. “What, you want me to lie to you?”

Maybe he does, just this once. But he shakes his head.

She taps a few times on the railing. The little shudders reach his hands, clenched around it. “But if you care that much… maybe you can still fix this,” she muses.

He doesn’t laugh. Doesn’t even point out the very questionable source of the dating advice. He can’t fix this. For Barry’s sake, he shouldn’t try.

A cough interrupts them. “Leonard?” Iris is hovering in the open doorway, looking about as exhausted as he feels. 

Len pushes a little way off the railing. “How is he?”

“Better. His healing factor’s working again.” Len lets out the breath it feels like he’s been holding all night. Iris hesitates. “He wants to see you.”

From any angle, it’s a terrible idea. But that’s why he’s still here, isn’t it? He glances around at Lisa, but she’s no use—just shoots him one of those patented Snart smirks. 

Throw away the plan. 

“Yeah, okay,” he says, and follows Iris back inside.

By the time they reach the blue med room door with its porthole window, Len’s urge to run has returned. But staying is the least he owes Barry. 

There's a surprise of a hand on his shoulder. “Just talk to him,” Iris advises.

For a fraction of a second, he freezes under her touch. Then he smirks, affecting that drawl they all expect from him. “I’m _told_ I’m good at that.”

Her replying smile is oddly sad. Then she turns around and walks away.

Len opens the door.

* * *

Barry sleeps, fractured and fitful, for what feels like days, but Caitlin says it’s only been a few hours.

“What do you remember?” she asks, with worried eyes.

His mind swerves away from that question. “Not much.” 

She seems to accept it, for now, turning back to her tests. Barry can handle tests. Just another night at STAR Labs, with him laid out, post-battle. It happens so frequently that he’s lost track of how often he’s ended up on this cot. Flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling, he listens to the steady beep-beep of the monitors. He drifts again.

When he next wakes, he moves his wrist and finds the IV gone. That’s when the little stream of approved visitors starts. He slips easily into the familiar role of reassurance. _I’m fine, Cisco. I’m fine, Joe. I’m fine, Iris_ —but he clings onto her hand, his resolve beginning to crumble.

“He really rescued me?” His memory is disjointed, getting fuzzier towards the end of his kidnapping, and he still doesn’t know if Len was a fabrication of his broken mind. 

“A few of the Rogues did, yeah.” Iris looks like she’s trying not to smile. “He was… almost heroic.” She raises an eyebrow, clearly aware of the irony.

Through the static in his brain, Barry nods.

“He’s still here, you know,” she adds, quieter.

Barry doesn’t know what he’s expecting, when he sends Iris to ask if Len will come and see him. But he definitely wasn’t expecting Len to turn up at the door of the room without protest. 

In full costume.

A shot of _wrong_ runs through Barry, like a scratch of nails down a blackboard. The brutal figure of Captain Cold clashing violently in his head with his naive image of his sweet, rakish maybe-boyfriend.

Even the costume isn’t right. His goggles shouldn’t be hanging loose around his neck. The hood of the parka shouldn’t be flopped down around his shoulders. Barry’s eyes drift down to the cold gun, hanging useless in its holster. He looks off balance. In the field, he’d be reveling in it all, not… ashamed of himself.

The reality of that costume is hitting Barry like a shot from Capt— from Leonard Snart’s gun. Len doesn’t belong in the Flash’s world. Len is _Barry’s._ He’s pancakes and picnics and long, lazy days in bed, Barry flipping him over, Len laughing up at him… He’s not Captain Cold.

Well, one of them has to speak first. “Hi,” Barry says.

Len just keeps staring at the wall, over Barry’s head. 

This lasts all of three more seconds before Barry gets irritated. “Would you sit down, please?” 

Len meets Barry’s eye for a tense second, and then his gaze slides away to the floor. He walks slowly to the chair beside the cot and sinks down into it.

During the chilly silence that follows, Len glances back at the door so much that Barry wonders if he’s going to bolt out of it. Would he really give up that easily?

Finally, Len asks, “Are you okay?”

Barry suppresses a bitter laugh that he’s so tempted to let out. He lifts his shirt. “All healed.” When they brought him back to the labs, three of his ribs were purple and broken. Now, of course, there’s no sign those fuckers ever touched him.

Len’s looking at him with a raw expression that Barry can’t read. He wonders if Len even knew the extent of his injuries. Another flash of fractured memory—Len bringing him home. Was he holding his hand? “You came for me,” Barry realizes aloud. Until now, his mind couldn’t make sense of it, that the rescue he prayed for came true. Now, looking Len in the eye, he can’t remember why he did.

“Yeah,” is all Len says.

The static buzzes in Barry’s head again. He says, “So. Captain Cold, huh?” 

Len drops his head back. “Don’t,” he says to the ceiling.

“Don’t _what,_ Len,” Barry snaps back, before he can think better of it. That rage simmering low inside him is fighting its way to the surface. “Don’t talk about it? I think we’re way past pretending we’re not who we are.”

Silence.

Barry shifts in the bed. His arms are still aching, in spite of his healing powers. It’s probably just in his head. Or maybe all of it was, and he was never chained to that pipe at all. He wouldn’t put it past those sociopathic psychics to fabricate the entire experience, just in his mind. Barry sure seems to have an easily manipulated imagination, if the man in the chair is anything to go by.

“That’s not what I meant,” Len mutters. Hard eyes fix on Barry. “What did they do to you?”

“I’m pretty sure you already know what those psychics do to metahumans,” Barry snarls. Only the flash of pain across Len’s face persuades him to slow down and answer properly. “Broke my ribs, restrained me with anti-meta cuffs, barely gave me anything to drink for two days, and…” He should stop talking, but the instinct to wield words like weapons is overwhelming. “And they tried to sever my connection to the Speed Force. I think they were working on controlling my powers like a light switch.” He shrugs. “I figure I was hours from death, if they hadn’t managed that soon.”

Len’s wide, horrified eyes are enough of a reaction to calm Barry down a bit. Maybe Len really hadn’t known much about what the psychics were going to do to him. It helps—a bit. Len’s eyes track down Barry’s blanket-covered form. “They hurt you.”

Trust him to get right to the point with a three-word summary. His face strongly suggests Barry’s captors won’t last the night if he gets near them, and for some reason that has Barry shaking with rage again. Len did this to him. He doesn’t get to be pissed about the results. “They’re headed to the meta wing of Iron Heights, and this is _not_ what I wanted to talk about.”

Abruptly, the chair squeaks back. Len stands, striding to the opposite wall. The tight, controlled way he’s holding himself is unfamiliar—for Len. _There you are, Captain Cold._

“And what did you want to talk about, Barry? Wanted to schedule date night for this weekend? Maybe a nice candlelit dinner?” His eyes narrow at the wall. “Or did you want me to say I’m _sorry?_ I’m not. The Flash is dangerous.”

“Stop talking about me in the third person.”

Len spins around, eyes widening, as if he didn’t realize he was doing that. And maybe Barry isn’t the only one having trouble dealing with secret identities.

Barry should stop, he knows he should, but it seems he can’t help digging the hole just a little deeper. “How much of our relationship was a lie, Len? Who _are_ you?” He throws up his hands. “Do you even work in security?”

Len has the gall to smirk at that. “I do, and I’m very good at it. Great way to get information for jobs. Blueprints, staff schedules, access to restricted areas, you name it.” He lounges back against the wall. Barry never meant to find that confidence compelling, but he always did. Then Len seems to notice Barry’s face, and his grin slips away. Barry thinks he sees regret just beneath. “I’m a common thief, Barry. Best you drop any fantasies that I’m anything better, before they get you hurt again.”

"Yeah," Barry croaks. A thief. A criminal. God, he’s probably done things that Barry would—

That chilly drawl, that Barry has never heard from the guy he’s dating, breaks into Barry’s spiralling thoughts. “But I’m not the only one who lied, am I Barry? All those nights you were _running late_ for dates.” He gestures wildly around STAR Labs. “You were doing this. And my people got hurt for it.”

Unbelievable. “Your _people_ are criminals!” Barry yells back, wincing as he pulls on ribs that shouldn’t hurt anymore.

“Please. Not exactly working within the limits of the law yourself, are you?” Len meets Barry’s eyes in pure challenge. Barry hates how much of a turn-on that is. “Like I said, you’re a dangerous guy, Barry. You put my crew at risk every time you tried to take us in. You broke my sister’s arm.”

Barry shakes his head. After the psychic attacks, his mind is still having trouble catching up. “Your sister…” Len raises an eyebrow, and Barry realizes aloud, “Golden Glider.”

“Right,” Len grates out.

“I didn’t know she was your sister,” Barry tries. It sounds hollow.

“Didn’t know you were the Flash.” Another smirk. “We’re even.”

The laugh that barks out of Barry doesn’t even sound like him. “We’re _what?”_ He pulls himself up, getting out of bed. 

On the other side of the room, Len flinches.

The idea that Len is afraid of him should be awful, but it only sharpens the broken shards cutting up Barry’s insides. “We’re not even, Len. I defended myself trying to stop you from doing blatantly illegal things. Until we made our deal, you were killing people. _You_ had me kidnapped by people you knew did horrific things to metahumans, who tried to rip the Speed Force out of me!” His hands are in his hair, frantic, but he doesn’t care. “And before that… Len, you lied to me for months. So, yeah, I’m sorry your sister got hurt when I was trying to _arrest you,_ but it doesn't begin to compare.”

Len has turned his face back to the wall. “You’re right,” he says, when the silence gets too much for both of them. He takes the couple of steps to the door, pausing with his hand on the handle. With his face cast in shadow, Barry can’t read his expression. “You’re not the only dangerous one around here, Barry. Stay away from me.” 

When he’s gone, Barry stares at the closed door for a minute or two. Then he climbs back into bed and pulls the blankets over his head.

Iris finds him there an hour later, and goes to seek out Cisco and copious amounts of chocolate. They watch old episodes of the Twilight Zone on Cisco’s laptop, all three of them squashed onto the tiny cot, until Barry falls asleep with his head on someone’s shoulder. He doesn’t know whose. He’s just glad they’re there.

* * *

Len doesn’t take Lisa up on her offer to hang out at the safe house. She seems determined to enjoy herself, after the complete failure of the auction house job, and apparently the rescue is enough reason for her to throw a party. He mutters something about wanting to crash at his own place. When she starts with the _Aww, Lenny,_ he tells her she can celebrate all she wants, but his only plans are to drink alone. She rolls her eyes, but there's a glint of knowing in them, and she stops arguing.

When Len reaches his motorcycle’s spot in the big parking lot under STAR Labs, Mick is waiting for him beside his own bike, helmet in hand.

Len sighs. “Really, Mick? Came all the way back here?”

“Had to check the good guys hadn’t done you and Lisa in during the night.” Mick’s eyes burn into him. “Ain’t leaving you alone, Snart. You think I don’t know what kind of mood you’re in? You’re gonna do something stupid.”

Smirking at him, Len says, “If I promise to be a good boy and not break any expensive toys—or conspicuous laws—will you leave me alone?”

Mick jabs a finger at him. “Fine. But I’m getting you to your door.”

The tone suggests Mick’s not in a mood to be argued with. Len shrugs two overly dramatic shoulders. “Fine. See me to my _door_ like a kid.” He gets on his bike.

In the mirror, he can see Mick on his tail all the way home.

They walk up Len’s stairs in silence—he needs to get that goddamn elevator looked at, but he’s not here often enough to bother with it. And without Barry to entice him back, he’s probably never going to be. At his door, he spins to glare at his partner. “There. You got me this far. Now fuck off.”

Mick grins, swinging off the bannisters like a kid as he watches Len. “You take care too, buddy.”

Len fumbles for his keys, but he only hears a few footsteps descending the stairs behind him. He turns back to see what Mick’s problem is now. 

Mick is in shadow, half way down the stairs, turned towards the darkness. “It wasn’t your fault,” he says.

With his hand still on the key in the lock, Len freezes. “Yeah. It was.” His voice comes out rougher than he expects it to.

“You didn’t know.”

Len hisses a laugh, shoving the door open. “It doesn’t matter.” He strides inside and slams the door behind him.

A useless click of the switch fails to illuminate the hallway. “Shit,” Len says into the empty dark. He knows he’s got a flashlight around here somewhere, but he doesn’t know where—he hardly knows this place—he’s never here, just runs from safe house to safe house, from job to pointless fucking job, as if there’s any purpose to his goddamn life— 

He gives up and stumbles towards the kitchen, where he’s pretty sure the fuse box lives. When he finds it, he resets a few switches.

The lights blaze to life around him. Len finds himself blinking at his kitchen table. Right there, where he left it, is a barely-touched picnic basket. The neck of an empty champagne bottle pokes out from the top. The champagne he poured away, a few days ago, on the lake shore, when Barry never made it to their date.

Because he was kidnapped, in an abandoned factory, getting the shit beaten out of him and the powers tortured out of him. 

Because Len had set him up.

Damn right, it’s Len’s fault. It was Len who heard about the gut-churning things those psychics had done to other metas, the state they’d left them in. Len tracked them down, arranged to hand the Flash over to them, and led the Flash right to their door. And left him there.

No—not the Flash.

 _Barry._

Who’s never going to forgive Len. 

Who shouldn’t.

He strides towards the basket, grabbing the empty bottle by the neck. Flings it against the opposite wall, where it shatters in a crash of broken glass that leaves him scuttling backwards, throwing defensive arms up around his head.

He slides down the back wall, ending up in a pathetic little heap on the floor with his head on his knees. He doesn’t get up again until Lisa finds him there, hours later.

“I fucked up, Lise.” It comes out hoarse and tired.

She sighs, sinking down next to him, pulling him against her side, like a tiny version of her used to whenever teen Len had one of his fits of rage and self-loathing. “Yeah, Lenny. You did.” 

It’s fitting, that it’s an echo of their earlier conversation. Everything’s spiralling.

He’s vaguely aware that he’s a terrible person for asking anyone to look after him right now, but he always was that. He’s just glad she’s there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to blueelvewithwings for beta reading, and for RetroactiveCon for looking over an early draft of a tricky scene for me.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Barry tries to find Len. Len tries to work out how to move forward. And Iris can't sit back and do nothing anymore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Expertly beta read by blueelvewithwings - thank you!

For the first few days after the rescue, Barry’s friends cluck around him like mother hens. He makes a big deal of how it gets annoying fast, but he’s grateful, too.

His speed comes back less reliably than his accelerated healing, in uncontrollable bursts of lightning. He gets up from the cot to go to the bathroom and runs into a wall, right into his hurting ribs that Caitlin says are showing no sign of lasting injury. He sinks to the floor in a heap.

When Cisco finds him there ten minutes later, he doesn’t ask Barry why he’s crying. He just sits down beside him, throwing an arm around his shoulders. 

“I’m an idiot,” Barry croaks into his hands.

Cisco rubs Barry’s back. “No, you’re not.” 

Iris takes him home, makes him mac and cheese, and sleeps on his couch.

Joe accepts no arguments when he invites Barry over for dinner that weekend, including Barry’s _I’m not really feeling up to it._ “You need to eat, Barr,” he says firmly, “and I know you’re not cooking on that tiny stove. It’ll cheer you up.”

Turns out, he’s right. Barry takes one step inside the house, gets a blast of the chicken pot pie aroma he remembers so well from childhood, and smiles.

“First time I’ve seen you do that since the kidnapping,” Joe says, walking in from the kitchen to give him a huge Joe-hug. _Dammit Joe—right again._ Barry is, in fact, feeling a bit better already.

He doesn’t want to talk about it, but he can’t help it. “I know you didn’t like him,” he tells Joe, pushing his chicken around his plate. 

“I didn’t meet him enough to not like him.” Joe points a fork at Barry. “I really wanna say this is the kind of thing that happens when you don’t tell your family what’s going on in your life.”

“I know.” Barry’s not sure he’s feeling up to Joe’s particular brand of directness, but there’s no avoiding reality in this house. It’s how Barry knows his foster father loves him. And he could probably use a dose of reality right now. It’s not like he can trust his own judgement. 

Joe sighs, reaching a hand across the table to cover Barry’s. “That doesn’t make this your fault.”

“Doesn’t it?” Barry ignores the burn behind his eyes. “I could have looked him up in the criminal database, Joe. I could have done a dozen things to figure out who he was, and I didn’t, because…”

“Because you loved him,” Joe finishes. He gazes at Barry for a long, thoughtful moment. “And for what it’s worth, from what I saw of him at the labs, I think he loved you too.”

Barry looks up into eyes that are hurting for him, and squeezes Joe’s hand. 

Then he picks up his fork again. “This is really good pot pie.”

It’s the last conversation he’ll have with Joe about Leonard Snart until the guy is back in Barry’s life.

* * *

One Sunday afternoon, a couple of weeks after the kidnapping, Lisa Snart turns up at STAR Labs. 

Barry is alone in the Cortex, staring at blank monitors with no promise of anything to hold his attention. “Nothing,” he mutters at the screen. “No evil metas. No Rogues…”

“Well,” purrs a voice behind him. “Maybe one Rogue.” 

And there’s Golden Glider herself. Unmasked, and she’s swapped her sparkly gold costume for jeans and a leather jacket.

He’s half out of his chair already. “Lisa. Hi.”

She holds out a little black box to him. “Thought you might want Hartley’s tech.” When he frowns at it, confused, she says, “It’s what we used to free you from the mind control. We figured you might want it. Evidence, or whatever.”

Accepting it, he asks, “Hartley made this for me?” The Rogues just keep surprising him.

“Yup.” She hops up on the desk, lounging back with her hands braced behind her. The gesture is so much like her brother that Barry could cry. 

“How is he?” Barry asks quietly.

Her tiny hitch of breath is all the clue he needs. “He’s been better. He misses you.”

Barry turns the box in his hands. For something that took down such a threat, it’s so small. “I doubt that,” he murmurs, almost forgetting she’s there.

“You’d be wrong,” she insists. He glances up, expecting to see pity in her eyes, but she just looks sad. “If you miss him too… You could do something about it.”

Barry doesn’t reply. His eyes are on the box, the last echoes of his own screams filling his mind.

Lisa shrugs. “Can’t blame a girl for trying.” With that, she jumps down from the desk and walks away.

Barry goes home and starts working through the latest pile of dishes, reminding himself he needs to ask Cisco to look at his dishwasher. He reaches up to the radio that sits on his windowsill. It’s not tuned to his usual station, and at first he can’t place the song that’s playing.

 _“We may never meet again, on that bumpy road to love,”_ he hears through the tinny speaker. _“Still I’ll always always keep the memory of…”_

Barry wipes a trail of water off a plate, blinking more out of his eyes. 

He fades back into the song when the singer reaches, “ _...the way you haunt my dreams, no, no, they can’t take that away—”_

Reaching up, he switches off the radio.

* * *

The following Saturday, when Iris stops by Barry’s apartment and finds that he hasn’t eaten again, she sighs and heads for the kitchen. “I can make _toast,_ Barry,” she insists, ignoring the fussy little noises behind her.

It’s a beautiful day, and the sunlight is streaming in from Barry’s courtyard. He really doesn’t appreciate that little garden enough. “Do you want my help in the courtyard today?” she asks. “We could set up some of those boxes you’ve got piled up there. You got any potting soil?”

Behind her, Barry goes quiet.

She turns around to see him staring at the stove. “I shouldn’t have lost it at him,” he says.

Iris sits down next to him. “Len?” she asks, but she knows the answer.

Barry nods. “I was angry, and I just let rip, and all of that might be the last thing I ever say to him. Said.” He scratches at a dirty mark on the table with a fingernail. “I think he really felt terrible.”

“He _should,”_ Iris snaps. She didn’t want to vilify Len, at first, even after everything that he did. Back at STAR Labs, he seemed so full of remorse that she could almost forgive him. But that was before he left Barry to deal with the aftermath alone. Two weeks later, she’s about ready to rip Leonard Snart a new one herself.

And then she sees her best friend’s face, and reaches out to take his hand. “I know how much you care about him, Barry. But he handed you over to people who _tortured_ you. Has he even told you he’s sorry for that?” 

Barry shudders slightly, wrapping his free arm around himself. “No.” He looks up at her. “Can I ask you a favor? There’s something I need to do at CCPD, and I don’t want to do it alone.”

“Of course,” she says, without having to think about it. “Anything.”

* * *

And so Barry ends up in his office with Iris on a Saturday evening, CCPD folder open to Leonard Snart’s mugshot, both of them sipping coffee while he scrolls through pages on the computer.

It’s a mess of a file, but it’s all arrests without charge. Other than a stint in juvenile detention and a couple of later prison stays for auto theft and trafficking stolen goods, it looks like nothing the police have tried to charge Leonard Snart with has ever stuck.

“Either he has a very good lawyer,” Barry muses at the screen, “or…”

Beside him, Iris shifts in her seat. “Or?”

Or the other option, the one Barry’s afraid of, because it means he might never know. “Or he’s so good at what he does, this isn’t going to tell me anything.” He came here for closure, but it looks like he isn’t going to get it. He leans back in his chair. “I should have looked at this file a long time ago.” 

“Why are you now?” Iris asks, a surprising lack of judgment in her voice.

Barry hasn’t talked to his friends about his stalled attempts to track Len down. His phone has been disconnected. Emails go unanswered. When Barry went to his apartment, no one answered the door. It’s clear that Len doesn’t want to talk.

For a little while, Barry even thought about tracking down the Rogues’ safe houses. Between STAR Labs and CCPD, he could find Len if he wanted to. But he realized how that would look. From his side, creepy and stalkerish. From theirs... The Flash might as well be declaring war on Captain Cold.

“I miss him,” Barry admits. It comes out a little flat. “Is that terrible?”

She shakes her head. “Oh, Barry.”

It’s too weird, hearing that tone from the friend who’s been teasing him about his romantic disasters for the whole of his dating life. He elbows her. “Don’t _oh Barry_ me.” 

Iris sticks her tongue out at him. “What? I can be sympathetic!”

“Sure you can.” He rocks on the back legs of his chair, sighing. “What’s wrong with me, Iris?”

She reaches over to stop him from falling backwards on his ass. “Do you really want me to answer that?”

He laughs. It’s not enough to distract him. “I don’t know what I’d say to him even if I did find him.”

She pauses, clearly taking him seriously, and it warms Barry’s aching heart a little. His friends haven’t been telling him in words to move on, but they’ve been hinting at it. Joe’s been using the conspicuous past tense to talk about his son’s relationship with Len. Cisco won’t mention the guy at all. But Iris has been quiet, waiting for Barry to open up to her. He kind of loves her for that.

“Do you want to forgive him?” she asks.

“No… I don’t know. Not yet.” He hears his voice drop to a whisper. “I’m still angry.”

Iris nods. “Would be weird if you weren’t.”

Maybe Barry didn’t mean everything he said to Len at STAR Labs that day. Or maybe he did, but he’s said it now. But it doesn’t matter what he meant. Len will be spiralling now, regardless. Barry just hopes he’s got someone there to help. 

When he’s quiet for too long, Iris elbows him in the side. “Okay, then do you want to talk it out with him?”

Chewing on his lip, Barry wonders what he does want. “Maybe. Without slinging accusations around, this time. But I can’t even find him, so what’s the point in wondering?” He sighs again. “Am I a complete chump for still caring about him, Iris?”

“Nah.” She bumps his shoulder. “And you know I’ll stand by you whatever you decide to do.” She makes a face. “After I have kicked his ass a suitable amount, which might be quite a lot.”

Barry grins. “Have I told you recently that you’re the best friend in all the worlds of the known multiverse?”

“I’d better be,” she says, reaching over and shutting down the computer, after a nod from Barry. “No one else is going to put up with your crap.”

He laughs. She’s probably right. 

To thank her, Barry takes her to Big Belly Burger, where Cisco and Caitlin join them for a truly obscene quantity of food and milkshakes.

* * *

Len’s sitting on his couch when Lisa’s voice filters through from the front door. “It’s fine, I can break in myself,” she calls. Appearing in the living room door, she adds, “Don’t get up. Wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself.”

Len’s been squatting—literally—in the Keystone house. It’s off the grid, with no internet, phone or electric. It’s better this way. Any of those things can get you tracked down.

He left the main safe house a week ago, when the Rogues started irritating the hell out of him. Even Mick, standing with his hands on his hips, glaring into Len’s room, where he was sprawled out on his bed in the middle of the day. “You’re being even more of a little bitch than usual, Snart. Get your head outta your ass and go talk to your _boyfriend,_ before one of us kills you." And Len couldn’t do that. So he got out of their way.

Lisa is standing in the doorway with her hands on her hips, glaring at him. “Why are you still here, Lenny?”

“Got shit to do,” he says to his copy of _Eichmann in Jerusalem,_ casting a long shadow in the thin candlelight.

She slumps into the ratty armchair opposite him. “You’re reading a book.”

He considers acting like he's surprised to see it in his hands, but he can't be bothered. “A seminal one. What do you want, sis?”

Lisa’s eyes have narrowed at him. Trust her to waste her time worrying about him. “Lenny…”

“No.” 

She raises an eyebrow. “You haven’t heard what I’m going to say.”

Len turns a page. “And yet somehow I can tell I’m not gonna like it,” he says lazily. “Must have developed magical powers of precognition.”

She’s not deterred, but her voice gets softer. “You should talk to him.”

 _Of course._ His meddling little sister never could keep her nose out of places it didn’t belong. “Tried that.” He turns another page. “Didn’t go so well, remember?”

After a moment, he glances up. Lisa is leaning forward, chin in her hands. “You’re a jackass.”

He shuts the book with a snap. “You know what? Fine. Get it all out. I can read when you’re done.” To give his hands something else to do, he reaches over for the fidget toy on his coffee table. He can’t remember if the little cube was Axel’s or Mick’s, but it found its way here and he’s keeping it. 

Lisa takes full advantage of the opportunity. “You should have known this relationship was bad news.”

Oh, _now_ she wants to do ‘I told you so’? Excellent timing. “For the last time, I didn’t know he was the Flash.”

Click-click, goes his thumb on the cube. This thing is great for dexterity practice. 

She laughs. “Only because you didn’t do your homework. The great Leonard Snart, brought low by the charms of a superhero.”

He wants to be pissed at her, or at least indulge in their usual mutual annoyance. Anything but this numb ache that’s been his world for, what, three weeks? But she’s right. He was dating a guy with access to the CCPD’s criminal records database, whose foster father had arrested Len at least once. Even if Len couldn’t have predicted the spectacular way it was going to blow up in his face, he must have known he was playing with fire. But he doesn’t remember thinking any of that, at the time. What the hell happened to his infamous strategizing skills?

“He and I had a deal,” he says. It sounds like an excuse. His thumb moves to the endlessly spinning wheel on the other side of the cube. “Got a point, or are you just trying to annoy me?”

Lisa shakes her head like he’s being dense. “The _point,_ Lenny, is that you did some very dumb things because you’re in love with him, and it’s obvious you still miss him. So why are you sitting in this shithole pretending you want to be alone?”

The rage has been building so slowly that he didn’t realize he was angry, but suddenly it’s clouding everything. He finds himself at the window, staring out over broken paving stones and patchy grass. “Because I hurt him.” He runs a shaking hand across his head. “You saw the state he was in. Might as well have beaten him myself.”

“Bullshit.” Lisa folds her arms defensively across her chest. “You know damn well what the difference is. You made a hell of a mistake, but it doesn’t make you a monster. It doesn’t make you—” She cuts off, shaking her head.

“Sure about that?” He turns back to the window. All he can see is Barry, gray-faced and chained to a pipe.

Lisa, Mick—why are they all so invested in the idea that it’s not his fault? 

_They don’t want to admit they’re capable of the same thing,_ replies a cold little voice in his head.

“Okay,” she says, stepping right up beside him. “The way I see it, there’s three things you need to think about. Thing number one: you didn’t know.” He huffs his impatience at her. “Thing two: it doesn’t matter. If you can’t be with him and _not_ hurt him, you should stay the fuck away from him.”

That shocks him enough to glance over at her. There’s granite in her eyes. “You said three,” he murmurs. 

She lets her head fall back against the window glass, trying to catch his eye. It’s annoying. “Thing three. What are you gonna do to make this right?”

Oddly enough, that does kind of clarify things.

He realizes he’s staring at her, and looks awkwardly away with a cough. “I could use a drink. Don’t suppose you brought anything?”

Reaching into her sparkly bag, she produces a bottle of single malt like she’s pulling a weapon on him. He grabs it, smirking, and holds back from commenting on his life full of unhealthy relationships and unhealthier habits. 

He heads for the kitchen, pausing at the door. She’s still staring out of the window. “Thanks, Lise.” 

She turns around to give him an unimpressed head tilt. “Sentimental bastard.” 

At least one thing in his life is as normal as ever.

* * *

Iris knows she should tell Barry what she’s doing. This is the worst time for someone he cares about to be keeping things from him. But she figures it’s better to ask forgiveness than worry about permission.

It takes a few days, but one night she stumbles across what she’s looking for. The deeds to a downtown dive bar called Saints and Sinners. The owner is listed as one Leonard Wynters, a name that doesn’t turn up on any other record she can find. And now that she knows who Captain Cold is, the alias seems just obvious enough. Only one person in Central City could be that much of a show-off.

Journalism has taken Iris to some dangerous locations, and this seedy bar is far from the worst of them. But, she thinks as she pushes open the creaking door, she’s not sure she’s ever felt this nervous chasing a story.

The tall guy behind the bar doesn’t even try to hide the way he looks her up and down. “What can I do for you, doll?” He winks at her. 

She reins in her immediate thought, which is to kick his ass, and sits down on a bar stool. “I’m here to see Leonard Snart. I’m a friend.”

He laughs. _“You’re_ friends with Leonard Snart.” She raises an eyebrow at him. “Fine. If the boss don’t like you, he can throw you out himself.” He yells over his shoulder, “SNART!” 

There’s a light on beyond the door just behind the bar. “One sec,” a familiar drawl says.

And then Iris is face to face with Leonard Snart. Who seems to be frozen to the spot, appropriately enough. “Iris.” He glares at the barman. “Be somewhere else, Parker.” 

He sits down across from her, a guarded look in his eyes. Even if she hadn’t seen the deeds, it would have been clear Leonard owns the place. He fits, maybe more than he ever did in Barry’s life. There’s less of the Captain Cold about him here, but as plain old Leonard Snart, he’s suddenly a lot more terrifying.

Iris looks over her shoulder. Other than a couple in a dimly-lit corner who seem very occupied with each other’s faces, there’s no one else around. “Am I safe here, Leonard?” 

His eyes snap up from the bar to meet hers. “Of course.” He glances around the quiet room. “But if you’d rather go somewhere more public…”

She shakes her head. “I won’t be long. I just want to talk for a minute.”

He shrugs his shoulders almost to his ears. “Guess I do owe you guys.”

“That’s one way to put it.” She’s trying to meet his gaze, but his eyes keep flitting away, as he sits there with his arms wrapped around himself. And Iris is angry, but she’s not completely heartless. It’s one thing to imagine all the things you’d say to the guy who hurt your best friend, and another to see him looking like that. “Leonard, I’m not going to get mad at you for what you did. It’s done. You didn’t know you were doing it to Barry, and you did step up and help us rescue him. And, honestly, it’s between you and him.”

He clears his throat. “Then why are you here, Iris?”

The past few weeks flicker through her head like a gloomy film reel. Staying on Barry’s couch, talking him down from ugly nightmares of demons who made him hurt people he loves. Watching him get quieter with every day that passes without a word from Leonard. She’s had a while to plan what she would say if she saw Leonard again, and her imagination has been _very_ forthcoming. But now she doesn’t have it in her to hurt him nearly as much as she wants to. “You left,” she says. “I can forgive a lot of things, and Barry can forgive even more. But you disappeared without even telling him you’re sorry.” She leans forward just a fraction, refusing to let him squirm away from her stare. “He’s suffering, and you won’t even tell him where you are.”

Leonard produces a cloth from somewhere and starts wiping down the bar. “Barry made it very clear he didn’t want to talk to me.”

Iris smothers a laugh. “Oh, come on. Have you met him? You must know he’s like a boiling pot when he’s angry. Everything bubbles up to the surface, and then he’s done.” She swings on the back legs of her stool, watching him. “But you didn’t even let him get past that.”

Leonard pauses, staring at a dark streak on the bar. “I did something unforgivable.”

“You don’t know if that’s true. You haven’t asked the only person who can choose to forgive you.” Her stool creaks as she stands up. “I think you’re just scared.”

Ah, there’s the rage she’s been waiting to see on his face. She wonders who it’s aimed at. “No offence, Iris, but you don’t know me.”

She shrugs, tugging her purse up over her arm. “No, I don’t. And I shouldn’t even be here. But he’s my best friend, and we’ve been through a lot together, and I couldn’t see him going through even more without…” As suddenly as they started pouring out of her, the words stop coming. “I just wish you’d told him you were sorry.” 

And she turns and walks away.

At the top of the steps, she looks back over her shoulder. “You still could, you know. He might even still listen.”

“Haven’t made it right yet,” he murmurs.

She’s not sure what he means by that. “You haven’t tried.”

On Barry’s couch, an hour later, she watches tense hands wrapped tight around a coffee mug. “I didn’t ask you to do that,” he says.

Right—time for the ‘asking forgiveness’ part. “Are you mad?”

Barry shakes his head, giving her an uncertain smile. “Should have known you’d be the one person in my life dumb enough to try this.” 

She flicks his shoulder. “I think you mean angry enough.”

“That too.” His eyes are shining when he asks, so hopefully, “You think he’ll call?”

She can’t bring herself to tell him not to count on it. “Maybe.”

His optimistic nod is going to break her heart.

* * *

Barry is lying awake that night when his phone buzzes.

He reaches over to grab it, expecting Iris or Cisco’s name to light up the dark. Instead, it’s an unknown number.

He stares at it for a minute, before he realizes it’s going to ring out if he doesn’t do something.

Okay. Green key. “Barry Allen speaking.”

The silence lasts so long that he thinks it must be a wrong number. He’s about to hang up, when—

_“Hey.”_

Barry’s not unfamiliar with the feeling that his heart is going to beat out of his chest. But in all his years of running, he doesn’t think it’s ever gone this fast before. He’s sitting up so quickly he must have moved into Flashtime to do it, reaching for the lamp switch. “Len?”

_“Yeah. Look, I know you might not want to talk to me—”_

“No, it’s okay,” Barry rushes to say. 

_“I know it’s late.”_ Len’s voice is rough. _“Don’t even know what I wanted to say. And I— I know I don’t have the right, but… I just wanted to ask how you are.”_

That’s Leonard Snart code for _I just wanted to hear your voice._ Barry blinks something out of his eye. “I’m okay.” For the past few hellish weeks, Barry has been rehearsing what he’d say if he got this call, but now he can't remember anything he wanted to say. He could never predict whether he’d want to slam the phone down on Len or talk for hours. Turns out, the truth is somewhere in the middle. “But yeah, it is late. Do you want to talk tomorrow?”

Len is quiet. Barry’s trying not to cry, desperately hoping it can’t be heard down the line. He couldn’t handle Len backing off again now. Not even because he thinks he doesn’t deserve to talk to Barry.

 _“Yeah,”_ Len says at last. _“I really do. When’s good for you?”_

The small talk they end with is awkward, but it’s far more than Barry could have imagined before today. For the first time in weeks, he falls asleep feeling hopeful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter, Len tries to make things right, but he doesn't mean for Barry to find out...


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A mystery leaves Barry trying to work out what Len is up to now. He's surprised when he finds out.

That first phone call is nice, if a little awkward. They don’t talk about much. Mostly, Len asks about Barry’s life, since he knows his way around the basics of that. Barry infodumps about some new scientific process he’s using in evidence analysis, while Len sits back and listens. He always did love hearing Barry talk about the things that mattered to him.

If he's being honest—a rare event for him—Len can admit he doesn’t know what to say. He decides against the direct approach, for now. ‘Please forgive me for arranging for you to be kidnapped and tortured and maybe worse’ probably wouldn’t go down too well.

So after that first phone call, Len doesn’t call back. Neither does Barry.

But it's Len who starts the text exchange that goes on for a week. He starts with the occasional _Hey, how are you?_ When he gets cute emojis back, he tries something Barry won’t expect. A picture of a coffee cup, when he’s at Jitters, to make Barry smile. Then, because it’s Saturday morning, another of a plate of pancakes, tagged _I made these and thought of you._

It’s too much. Len slams the phone face-down on the table.

A moment later, it buzzes.

It’s a picture of McSnurtle the turtle, swimming around his little tank. No comment, except a smiley face and a turtle emoji. But it’s a glimpse into Barry’s life that Len never thought he’d get again. He opens that photo over and over, all day. 

There’s more back and forth over the next few days, until Len’s almost comfortable with this new breaking of the ice. And then he has to go and ruin it.

It’s been a long day, and not enough to fill it with. He quit his auction house security job just after the ill-fated heist. He’s been spending too much time at Saints and Sinners intimidating the new manager. When he comes in at eleven-thirty, he’s tired and cranky. Maybe he’s just been holed up alone in the squat too long, and it’s making him think too hard about his life.

Even as his thumbs are moving across the keys, Len knows it’s too early to ask this. He asks anyway.

_Can I see you?_

Len stares at the blank phone screen for half an hour before he gives up and goes to bed. 

When he wakes up, late the next morning, the reply he’s been expecting is waiting for him.

_Scarlet: I don’t think that’s a good idea._

He’s right, of course. Len’s been letting his excitement run away with him. If he’s not careful, they’ll end up right back where they were before this mess began. He knew how to control his impulses, before Barry. He can do it again.

But Barry’s the one who gets to make that call. Len texts back, _Do you want me to stop contacting you?_

When there’s no reply a full day later, Len gives Barry space. It’s the least he owes him.

* * *

Barry sticks his head around the door, spying Caitlin by the medical cot. “Cisco said you were looking for me?”

“Hi, Barry." Caitlin smiles at him as she heads back to her desk. "Yeah, I just had a question.”

He swings into the room, flipping a chair around so he can sit backwards in it. “Shoot.”

“Did you donate to something called the Safe Metas Project?”

Barry gives a proportion of STAR Labs’ profits to charity every year, but that name doesn’t ring a bell. “Not me. Why?”

She frowns at her computer screen. It’s set to a web page featuring a generic painting of a house. “They emailed to thank us for a donation made in our name. I called to say I didn’t think that was us, and they apologized and said it was a mistake.”

Stranger and stranger. “What do they do?”

“That’s the thing—they’re pretty vague. They rescue metahumans in trouble, but that’s all I know. They’ve got enough info on the website that someone could track them down if they needed help, but the bare minimum otherwise. I don’t even know where they’re located.” She shakes her head at the screen. “It’s like they’re afraid of…” She glances up at him.

Barry sighs. “People like us?” 

Caitlin nods sadly. “Ever worry that STAR Labs sometimes gets lumped in with the last incarnation of ARGUS?”

He does. ARGUS has changed for the better, but it still has a chilling reputation among the metas, who have a long memory of the Suicide Squad and whatever the hell else they used to get up to there. Barry hates the idea that STAR Labs and the Flash have somehow inherited that legacy with some of them, but he’d have no idea where to start dealing with the image problem.

“The woman from the project didn’t really want to talk to me,” Caitlin is saying, “but she did hint at something interesting.” She turns thoughtful eyes on Barry. “I think they might be rehabilitating victims of the psychics that you, uh, encountered.”

Barry steels himself through the surge of rage he gets every time he thinks of Psyche and Ghoul. He raises an eyebrow at the plant on Caitlin’s desk. “You did say I was lucky I was only there two days.”

“You were,” she says absently, turning back to the screen. “I don’t want to imagine what would happen to a metahuman they got their hands on for any longer than that.”

The ones whose powers Psyche and Ghoul did learn to control. The poor bastards the psychics kept for months, if rumors can be believed. Barry stretches away phantom stiffness in his arms. “And this, uh...” He checks the screen. “The Safe Metas Project. They got a donation in my name?”

“Not officially. I think maybe something said in confidence ended up on their records.” Caitlin shrugs. “But if you don’t know anything about it, I guess it’s just mistaken identity.”

Mistaken identity…

Grabbing the notepad by Caitlin’s computer, Barry scribbles down the website url and tears off the top page. “Gotta run, Cait,” he calls back from the door. “Sorry I couldn’t help!”

If she says anything in reply, he’s already three blocks away and doesn’t hear it. He’ll apologize later.

* * *

It takes Len a few tries to shove the door open. He leans down to look at it, sighing when he spots a busted hinge. The farmhouse that the Safe Metas Project uses as its base of operations is run down, to say the least. No wonder he’s useful around here.

“Morning, Sofía,” he says to the woman on reception.

She doesn’t so much as say his name, but she shoves a bunch of keys at him. “Dishwasher’s stopped working. Look and see if something’s come loose, would you?” When Len just tilts his head at the offered set of keys, she asks drily, “You do know the way to the kitchen, right?”

Len’s been turning up here for a few weeks now. The first time, it was because he’d heard they only accepted donations in cash. He could understand that. So he presented them with a thick envelope and walked away with no intention of doing anything else.

A week later, he was back again. He never mentioned the word ‘volunteer’ to Sofía, the no-nonsense woman who runs the place, but she seemed to get the message when Len kept saying things like, “Couldn’t help but notice the broken window as I was driving past.” 

A few days after that, Sofía peered at him and said, “Not gonna complain if you wanna stick around and keep making yourself useful. But I gotta see a criminal records check soon.”

Len understood why. He’d seen the metas haunting the halls of the farmhouse like ghosts. They’d be easy pickings to a metahuman black market trafficker posing as a volunteer. Sighing, he lounged back against the reception counter. “Let’s just say I can’t even put in a _request_ for one of those without triggering several open warrants.” He could have just given her one of his locked-tight aliases that had fooled a dozen security companies, but that didn’t feel… right. He didn’t want to put people at risk.

And he _was_ a risk.

He was seriously considering just walking out and not coming back, when she said, “Huh. Well, same probably goes for half the people here. Residents and staff.”

Len found himself staring at a dark patch of mold on the ceiling. He could probably fix that for them. “Can’t even tell you I’ve never hurt anyone. But I’m not meta black market, and I’m not Family.”

Sofía gave him a circumspect nod. “Okay. You can help out around the house during the day, when the cleared volunteers can keep a bit of an eye on you. No working with the residents till we know we can trust you.”

“No residents,” he agreed, and went off to unclog a toilet. 

Well, it’s not like people were ever his forté.

Len first saw Sofía’s meta power a week later. On his way down to fix a basement window that wouldn’t close, a crash above him had him darting back up the stairs. Sofía had her hand raised above the floating pieces of a broken vase. Len was about to cough, draw attention to himself, but the shattered pieces were already floating up to a side table and _back together._ A moment later, one unblemished vase stood on the table like it was never so much as dented.

Her eyes went very wide as she saw him. She took a step back.

“Didn’t see anything,” Len said, but it didn’t make her look any less freaked out. “You okay?” 

“Yeah.” She straightened up. “Well, hurry up. That window’s not gonna fix itself.”

Len has been coming back, almost every day, ever since.

Now, he looks at the bunch of keys that Sofía is offering out to him, then back up at her. “Without supervision?”

She laughs. “Fine. I’ll send Frankie in, if you’re that worried.”

He’s not sure why he chuckles back, but he does. He heads for the kitchen, feeling a little like it’s the first time anyone’s ever trusted him.

* * *

There’s a crack on Barry’s bedroom ceiling, spoiling the repeating stucco pattern. He’s been staring up at it for an hour, but he takes a break so he can text Iris. 

_I’m not coming to the movie. Apologize to Eddie for me, would you?_

_Iris: aww why not_

The ceiling already has his attention again. A minute or two later, he sighs and rolls over to grab his phone again.

_What’s the sole reason I’ve been depressed for the past six weeks?_

She sends back an angry face emoji that makes Barry smile for the first time all day. 

_Iris: what did he do now?_

_He asked to meet me._

_Iris: lkjfds SNART. that guy’s timing is as good as his research skills_

Barry snorts, covering his mouth even though he’s alone. 

_Iris: are you thinking about it?_

He sighs. That’s all he’s been doing. Thinking hasn’t really helped.

_Maybe. Too soon?_

_Iris: that’s up to you. just try to be careful ok?_

He shoots back a thumbs-up emoji. He’s just putting his phone down on the nightstand when he remembers the reason he started moping—the decision he was trying to make. He picks the phone up again. _Could you track down a place for me, if I had a name? They’re not official or registered anywhere._

His phone only rings once before he sits up and answers. Iris says, _“And why would I need to track them down for you?”_

Barry Allen, the fastest man alive, is often left very unimpressed at how slowly he thinks on his feet. “Uh…”

She tuts down the line at him. _“Barry. Is this somewhere you shouldn’t be going?”_

He drops back down onto the bed. There’s a lot of reasons he shouldn’t be going there. He’s going to ignore them all. “Probably. I’ve got a hunch about somewhere Len might be hanging out.”

She’s quiet for a second. _“Somewhere dangerous?”_

“Not for me.” He sighs again. “I’d be the danger.”

_“Huh,”_ is all she says to that.

“I promise I’ll be careful this time. There’s just something I need to check out.”

_“Okay. Send me the details you’ve got. Just please try not to get kidnapped this time, or Dad’ll be really pissed at me.”_ When Barry laughs, Iris asks in a conspiratorial tone, _“Does this mean you’re seeing him?”_

Such a good question. “Not— not socially. At least, not yet.” 

But, as he stares up at that thin, dark line running down the ceiling above him, ruining everything, he wonders what the real answer to Iris’s question is. If Len asked, would Barry start spending time with him again? He _wants to._ He just wants to run back into Len’s arms and forget that this whole mess ever happened. He knows all the very sensible reasons why he shouldn’t, and he can’t find it in himself to care. He just misses Len. 

It’s far too late to tell himself he should never have fallen in love. 

“Am I being too forgiving?” he asks, trusting Iris to give him a fair answer. 

She laughs. _“Yes, but you wouldn’t be you if you weren’t.”_

It’s a good enough answer for now. Barry chuckles back. “You’re too good to me.”

_“I am! And you can thank me by buying the movie tickets.”_

He huffs. “I said I wasn’t coming.” But he’s already up, pulling his shoes on.

_“That was before I cheered you up. And you know you can’t say no to Eddie. He’ll puppy-dog-eyes at you for days.”_

“I can’t believe we’re blaming your husband for your faults,” Barry says, looking around for his jacket. 

_“And who are we blaming for yours?”_

“Shut up.”

On the other end of the line, Iris laughs. Barry smiles. At least there are some people in his life who still make sense to him.

* * *

As Len heads to the kitchen, Frankie Kane passes him, half-sprinting the other way, and he gives her a head tilt. She’s a young volunteer who works with the metas. Len hasn’t asked if she has powers herself. Not his business.

“Oh right, I’m meant to be supervising you,” she calls back over her shoulder. “I’ll just be five minutes. Go wait out in the yard or something.”

It’s amazing how little he bristles at being given orders here. He steps out through the kitchen door. The overgrown yard is big enough that they could be growing their own veggies out here, but it’s too much of a mess right now. Maybe he’ll do some yard work—bring Mick for company. He’d like this place. 

It’s a nice day, so he puts a bit of space between himself and the farmhouse, heading for the fence that marks the edge of the property. He leans up against the fence, looking out over the dusty unmade road and the Keystone farms beyond. 

He frowns at a flicker of light ahead. _“You_ shouldn’t be here.”

Now that Len sees it up close, he can’t believe how smoothly the Flash goes from Mach 2 to an amble. Barry has his hands in his pockets as he heads for the fence. Thank God he hasn’t come in the Flash suit, though Len hopes even Barry wouldn’t be that naive. He watches as Barry glances up at the farmhouse and back down at his feet. He’s standing close enough for Len to touch, nothing but the low fence between him. “I know,” Barry says.

Len stares him down. “You know how many metahumans you’re putting at risk just knowing about this place, Barry? You could set off some seriously traumatized people if they recognize you.”

“Sorry,” Barry murmurs, looking like he really is. “Should I go?”

Gripping the wooden fence, Len takes him in. He’s looking good. Better than when Len last saw him, though that wouldn’t be hard. He sighs. “No. Stay.”

Barry smiles. “Got a second?”

Damn, Len’s missed that smile—as brilliant as the sun coming out, and just as overwhelming. “Yeah.”

Barry leans back against the fence, his face just inches away. Len allows himself to be studied. “You didn’t tell me you were doing this,” Barry says, glancing up at the farmhouse. “Keeping things from me again?”

Len feels his eyebrows go up. “This is not about you.”

“Isn’t it?” There’s a hint of anger in Barry’s voice. Nothing like during their disaster of a conversation at STAR Labs, but he still sounds defensive. As he should. Len’s been fooling himself if he thought Barry was just going to get over what Len did to him. “You gave them a donation in the name of STAR Labs.”

Oh, fuck it. The donation wasn’t in anyone’s name, but apparently rumors are spreading. Len’s going to have to do damage control now. The last thing he wants is for his associations to put this place at risk. He’d rather leave. “And what would you have thought if I’d told you, hmm? That I’ve been coming here because I feel guilty?” Barry’s eyes slide away to the ground in silent confirmation. “Right. And I give money to domestic abuse shelters because my mother was a survivor. Only care about things that affect me, right?” 

Barry pushes hard off the fence. “That’s not what I—” He pauses, frowning at Len. “You support DV shelters?”

“Yes,” Len says to the wide sky. He’s not in the mood to elaborate.

The look he’s getting from Barry is strange, but at least it’s not pity. “I didn’t know that happened to your mother.”

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me. Didn’t we cover that in our last little adventure?” As soon as the jab is out, Len regrets it, especially when Barry’s face crumples. Len’s hands curl around the rails of the fence as he tries to swallow down his low rumble of anger. He doesn’t want to go down this road again. Didn’t end well before.

But it might be too late for that. Barry is turning away. “I shouldn’t have come. I’m sorry.”

“Barry, wait.” Len reaches out a hand for Barry’s, then thinks better of it. He aims a wry smile at him, instead. “We’re hopeless.”

Barry leans back against the other side of the fence again, kicking the dust under his feet. “Little bit.” He takes a deep breath, as if he wants to start over. “I’m sorry for assuming.” He smiles up at Len. “Are you volunteering here?”

“More or less.”

Barry looks up at the house again. “How many of the people here escaped the meta black market?”

Len can see where this is headed, but he answers anyway. “Most, from what I hear.”

Barry’s eyes have gone dark. “Psyche and Ghoul?”

Len nods. “I don’t know details. But, yeah, sounds like some of them had encounters with that delightful pair.”

He can already tell what Barry’s thinking. His eyes are heavy with a familiar empathy. Just like when he wanted to call the cops on a woman in his building who seemed to have mental health problems, until Len sat him down and told him what could happen to her, and a wide-eyed Barry started wondering what he could do to help instead, and didn’t stop until he was leaving food parcels and walking her dog every day. Just like when he started talking to the homeless man outside Jitters, the one Len had mentioned he knew from years back. Len found himself getting updates on the guy’s wellbeing for weeks, until Barry found him a bed in a shelter. Long before he knew he was the Flash, Len knew Barry Allen was a hero. 

Barry’s approach may be clumsy, but… God, he’s too good for Len.

Not the point, he reminds himself. There are some very good reasons why Barry can’t be a hero here. “Please, Barry,” he murmurs. “You attract attention. They don’t need that. Try and stay out of this, okay?”

Barry nods. “Okay. And I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be stalkerish.” He’s staring thoughtfully at Len. “But really, I’m interested. Why are you here?” 

Len glances back over his shoulder, thinking of Emmeline, the kid who can move things with her mind, who hasn’t said a word since she was rescued from the meta black market. Len doesn’t want to know what happened to her there. He thinks about Precious, who must be in her fifties, who was with Psyche and Ghoul for months. Len doesn’t even know what her powers are—she never leaves her room. He says, “Just wanted to help.” A raised eyebrow from Barry prompts a little more out of him. “Couldn’t stand knowing there were more victims of those psychics out there…” He holds up a hand at the look crossing Barry’s face. “Don’t get any big ideas about reforming me, okay?”

“I wasn’t,” Barry says, but his hand twitches, as if he’s thinking about reaching out for Len. “I’m glad you’re doing something that matters.”

Against his better judgement, Len grabs his hand. “It’s good to see you, Barry.”

Barry smiles as his fingers thread into Len’s. “You too.”

Len holds on, remembering all the reasons he ever wanted to be with this incredible man. The day they met, at CC Jitters, when Barry made a tired, jaded Len laugh over mixed-up drinks orders. How their weekends together started to get Len through each week, the monotony of planning and jobs becoming worth it again, if he could see the man he loved at the end of it. The way Barry made him feel—like nothing else in his life could.

Barry’s aiming a curious look at Len. “What?”

Len tries not to give one of his dramatic shrugs in reply, because Barry deserves better than that. “I’ve missed you,” Len says. 

The smile Barry gives him is a little sad, but it’s hopeful. “Yeah. Me too.”

“Hey, Leonard,” a voice calls from the open kitchen door. Frankie is leaning out, squinting at the two of them. 

Len pushes off the fence. “Gotta go.” 

“Wait,” Barry says, pulling on his hand. “Can we talk properly soon?” 

Somehow, Len manages to keep his cool. “Sure. I could stop by your place. Unless that’d make you feel…”

“What?”

Just has to push, doesn’t he? “Unsafe,” Len finishes.

Slowly, Barry shakes his head. “My place is fine.”

A squeeze of Len’s hand, and Barry lets go. Then he’s off, walking back towards the main road at an almost normal pace. Well, at least he’s learning.

Len heads back towards the house, trying not to grin like a man who’s hopelessly in love. Not while he’s at work. When he reaches the kitchen door, Frankie’s hanging off the doorframe, still staring after Barry. 

“Took you long enough,” Len says. “Where’s this dishwasher?”

She follows him in. “You’re aware I know who that is, right?”

For the briefest of seconds, Len freezes. Then he spins around on his heel. “That a problem?” he asks casually.

She shrugs. “Nah. He’s okay. Just try not to bring him here again, would you?”

“Working on it.” But she’s still looking at him funny. More cautiously this time, he asks, “That mean you know who _I_ am?” 

She opens the space under the sink to reveal a mess of hoses and pipes leading to the dishwasher. “I might.” 

Len ducks his head down to look at those pipes.

“I mean,” Frankie goes on, “I know some people who know some people.”

“That right?” he murmurs, studying the pipes. He doesn’t owe this stranger an explanation. But as he reaches out for one of the tangled hoses, his hand is trembling.

“We’ve all got secrets,” she says, a bit too gently.

Focused on the dishwasher, Len doesn’t reply. He can see where the problem is now, with just one badly-fitted hose. The plumbing was messed up from the start. But maybe he can still fix it.

She shuffles behind him, apparently waiting for a damn answer. Len drawls, “Next you’ll be telling me we all make mistakes, too.”

“Well,” she says.

“Well,” he echoes. “I’ve made more than most, and the last one was a doozy. Is the water supply switched off?”

She gestures to a supply closet at the back of the room. “The controls are in there.” He glances over his shoulder to find her giving him an odd little smile. “I’m gonna check what else Sofía needs us to do. I can trust you with this, right?”

He pauses, then nods.

“Good,” she says, and saunters away. Leaving Len alone with too many thoughts, not all of them bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Expertly beta read and cheer-led as always by blueelevewithwings, and thanks to RetroactiveCon too for commenting on various bits and pieces for me.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Interfering fathers. Not exactly what Len needs right now. And just when he was feeling like he and Barry were making progress, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [I wrote Len and Barry's fluffy meet-cute](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25037338), as mentioned in chapter 1 of this fic. (It's so fluffy y'all. Hope it makes up for some of the angst that is not *quite* done here yet...)

Barry stares at his door for several seconds before realising he can’t be bothered to phase through it, and pulling a heavy bunch of keys from his satchel. He stumbles inside, flinging keys and phone onto the side table by the door, collapsing onto the couch and closing his eyes. 

And then his phone starts ringing. Speedster or not, there’s no chance he’s getting up to answer it. “Go away,” he mutters, reaching for the remote. There must be something brain-numbing on Netflix that he can fall asleep to. Obediently, the ringing stops.

When it starts up a few moments later, Barry sighs and drags himself off the couch.

 _“Hey,”_ Len’s voice says, and Barry feels his heart do that little flip-flop that it hasn’t done since he was first dating the guy. _“Hope I’m not disturbing you.”_

Barry flops back onto the couch, working on restoring his cool. “Nah. I’m just being a couch potato.” He tries to keep the yawn in, but it forces its way out.

 _“Work the late shift?”_ Len asks. He sounds more relaxed than he has since they first started talking again. Something sparks in Barry, safe like lightning. How he used to feel around Len, before… everything that’s happened.

“Just a bit.” Barry stretches out sore muscles across the couch. “I was booked for a twelve hour shift, and it ended up lasting fourteen.” 

_“Ouch.”_

“Yeah. The new crime lab director? Terrifying. She transferred from Gotham, and she’s been pushing us all pretty hard.”

 _“Ah,”_ Len says knowingly. _“Gothamites think they’re so tough, but it’s all talk. They’ve all got a story that makes it_ sound _they’ve met the crazy clown, but none of them ever did. I think he might even be a myth. And the other larger-than-life villains.”_

Barry laughs, tucking the phone between his head and shoulder, stretching his arms lazily behind his head. “You’re as bad as Ol— as the Green Arrow. Batman and the Joker both definitely exist. And Maryam says her evidence analysis helped bring in the Riddler.”

_“Of course she does. And Joe West claims he’s one of only three cops ever to bring in Leonard Snart, but do you see me languishing in Iron Heights?”_

There’s nothing about that sentence that doesn’t hit a little close to home. 

Barry must go quiet for a bit too long. Len sighs. _“Can I take that back?”_

“It’s okay,” Barry says. “We need to get used to this thing where I’m the Flash and you’re…”

 _“You can say it, Barry,”_ Len says gently.

But, even after all these weeks, Barry still isn’t sure he can.

* * *

That’s when the notes start.

Barry is at work for the first one. As he arrives at his desk in the morning, something seems out of place. He frowns at his potted plant, a little lily that Iris gave him “because your desk is depressing.” The plant has very clearly been moved to the right of its usual spot. As he slides it back into place, he spies the note peeking out from under it. 

_Hope you have a great day. Stay cool._ Barry snorts at the careful handwriting, familiar from birthday cards and shopping lists. Grinning, he turns it over, and…

There’s a drawing on the back. It’s Captain Cold, in full color—Barry bought Len those watercolor pencils for Chanukah. The sketched figure is wearing a parka and a flirty smirk that Barry is well acquainted with.

He laughs out loud. Getting into CCPD in the night would require climbing locked fire escapes and then getting past barred windows, state-of-the-art alarms and some serious security cameras. Barry’s kind of impressed. And… oddly touched.

From the other side of the lab, Julian snaps, “What’s wrong with you, Allen?”

Nope, Barry’s not even letting Julian Albert ruin his day. “I have a very surprising boyfriend.”

Julian _almost_ smiles. “I thought you weren’t talking?” 

Barry looks back at the sketch. Captain Cold smirks up at him, all too captivating. Just like the real version. “It’s complicated.”

But maybe getting less complicated. Just a little.

Iris comes over that evening. They’re just settling in for an episode of Stranger Things when something catches Barry’s attention, out in the hallway. He peers towards the front door. “Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?” she asks through a spoonful of ice cream.

Barry flashes to the door, phasing through it. There’s no one there, but a cool breeze from the open hall window draws his attention. A peek outside shows nothing but passers-by down in the street. “Huh,” he says, and turns back to his door. 

There’s a note on the mat, sticking out from under the W of ‘WELCOME’. Biting down on a smile, Barry reaches down for it and brings it into the apartment.

Iris is giving him a curious look from the couch. “What is it?”

He sits down, holding the note between them. It’s a drawing of the Flash. Trails of lightning are zipping off his bright red suit in all directions, while he turns his face to the left and beams like… well, like Barry Allen.

Iris snorts. “Len?”

“Who else?” Barry can’t keep the smile in now. Len’s just too adorable.

She smooths out the corner of the page where it’s a bit dog-eared. “Has he been doing this a lot?”

He shakes his head. “Just once, this morning. He broke into CCPD to leave one on my desk.”

“Bold,” she says, with a raise of an eyebrow.

Barry is staring at the text beneath the drawing. _New suit looks good on you._ It shouldn’t surprise him that Len has seen him in the suit Cisco made to replace the one that got damaged by— in the kidnapping. But he can’t remember coming up against Captain Cold since then. The Rogues have gone deep underground, if they’re even operating at all.

“You okay?” Iris asks.

“Mm-hmm.” He looks back up at the drawing. “I think he’s trying to tell me something.”

An idea occurs to him. In a moment, he’s flashed away and returned to the couch with pen and paper.

Iris sighs. “Barry, do I have to tell you to be careful again?” 

She taps the arm of the couch beside her when he doesn’t answer. He’s too busy scribbling. “...It’s just a note, Iris.”

“Sure it is.” She pats him on the back with a sigh, which he ignores. “Have you even talked to him properly yet? I seem to remember you had things to work out.”

Irritation flares in him, simmering down when he looks up at her concerned face. She’s sweet, but there’s nothing going on between Len and Barry that his friends need to worry about. “Soon,” he says, and turns the TV back on. “I’ll talk to him soon.”

* * *

Len unlocks his apartment door for the first time in about two months, and gets the oddest sense that he’s home. The place in Keystone was getting depressing, and he didn’t become a thief so he could squat in damp shells of safe houses for no good reason. But he never used to spend enough time at this apartment to think of it as home. No, that started when things with Barry got more serious. The success of the bank job, soon after they met, meant Len had to lay low for a while. Having this place to bring Barry back to was just convenient, really.

The place looks pretty good, even after two months empty, and Len’s pleased to see all his home comforts. But once he’s unpacked, he finds that the apartment is just as quiet and empty as the Keystone squat. He doesn’t know what’s missing. 

He makes his way out onto the fire escape, and from there, up onto the roof. There’s a clear night sky, stars like diamonds as far as he can see. And, ah, there’s the chair he left up here, rusting a little against the wall. Len unfolds it and stretches out to watch over his city, beer in hand, with the busy roar of the traffic beneath him.

Out in the distance, he can just make out the shadow of STAR Labs. Len used to look at those clawed towers and see the stronghold of his enemy, with its rumours of illegal prisons and experiments on metahumans. He wonders when that changed, the familiar shape of it starting to make him smile. Barry will be there now, probably, holding back whatever threat the city is facing tonight. It’s strange, but the thought makes Len feel safer. 

He grips the sides of his deckchair. From the direction of STAR Labs, something is approaching. Fast.

When he recognizes it, he laughs out loud. The Flash approaches in a trail of fire lighting up the night, then _runs up the side of the building._ Wow, that looks impressive from up close. Not that Len’s about to give that away.

“Hi,” Barry says, skidding to an amusingly clumsy stop, a few feet away. 

Len takes a sip of his beer. “Hello, Flash.”

Grinning like he’s pleased to see him, Barry looks around. “Nice roof.”

For the image, Len attempts not to smile. He may not be in the parka, but Barry _is_ in the Flash suit. “I thought our appointment to talk was tomorrow.”

Even under the cowl, Len can see Barry’s face fall. Maybe _appointment_ was too distant a word. “Right,” Barry says. “I…” He trails off, frowning at the gray concrete beneath them.

Slowly, Len gets up from his chair. He moves carefully towards him, giving Barry every chance to move away, leave if he wants to. But he doesn’t. 

Len’s eyes drift to Barry’s lips, the only part of his face he can really see, and for a moment he’s all too tempted. But he knows how to control himself. Instead, he reaches out to touch his fingers against Barry’s. 

Barry smiles and takes his hand, squeezing his fingers around Len’s. “I brought you something.”

“Did you?” Len takes the note Barry holds out. 

“I should go,” Barry says. He glances bashfully up at Len. “I didn’t think you’d be here.”

Len tilts a confused head. “What exactly were you planning, Flash?”

That grin is the cutest. “Running into your apartment—phasing right through all your Leonard Snart-level security, planting the note and leaving again.” He gives a sad sigh. “It would have been epic.”

“It would have,” Len agrees, giving in and smiling. Image be damned. He never really appreciated having this incredible man in his life. Not until he didn’t have him anymore.

Rubbing the back of his neck—oh, Len’s missed that bashful little gesture—Barry says, “I didn’t know you were staying here again.”

“It’s home.” Len shrugs, spurred on by Barry’s warm smile. “A step up from a squat, anyway.”

Barry gives Len’s hand one more squeeze before pulling out of his grasp. He moves to the edge of the roof, with a look back that, if Len’s not just fooling himself, might be longing. “Bye, Len.”

And in that moment, Len just can’t do it anymore. He’s tried so hard to give Barry space. And maybe it’s the sudden, unexpected closeness, but all at once Len can _feel_ the lonely weeks of separation, of pretending he doesn’t miss Barry so much it hurts. But he does, and he can't wait any longer. “Barry. Hold on.”

Barry turns back around.

Len clears the space between them in two wide paces. Barry’s eyes widen, but he still doesn’t move. Len catches his chin, pausing there. “If you tell me to stop, I will,” he murmurs.

In the end, it's Barry who kisses Len.

Everything stops. There’s nothing and no one in the world except the two of them, alone on a rooftop above Central City. Kissing each other like two people who know they shouldn’t, and don’t care. Just for a moment.

Barry is the first to pull away, too, staring at Len through blown pupils made stranger by his mask. “I should go.” He sounds distant, like he’s already left, but he’s looking at Len like he never wants to leave this rooftop.

Len nods, and lets him go.

He watches the lightning trail zig-zagging through the city beneath him until it disappears, and then he sits down to look at the note. It’s a sheet of paper torn from an art sketchbook, much fancier than the kitchen notebooks Len’s been scribbling his drawings on. 

The drawing is a simple sketch of two men, in ballpoint ink. One in a leather jacket, one in a cardigan. Holding hands. 

Underneath, Barry has scrawled, _We’re not just the costumes. We’re everything we are._

Len hopes he’s right.

He settles back in his chair to finish his beer, raising it once in the direction of STAR Labs. Then he heads downstairs.

* * *

Barry has barely made it through the door at Joe’s, and Iris is already turning sharp eyes on him, beckoning him to the table. “Dad’s in the kitchen,” she hisses. “You’ve got, like, three minutes to explain what you texted on your way here.”

“Where’s Eddie?”

“Late shift,” she whispers. “Can we focus on your love life right now, please?”

Sitting down, Barry drops his voice to the same whisper. “I may have… kissed Len.”

Iris drops her head onto the table. “So much for telling you to be careful,” she says, muffled.

Barry waits.

Her faux distress lasts all of ten seconds before she raises her head. “You’re lucky there’s no time for me to lecture you.” She prods him. “So? Tell me everything.”

He waves frantically at the archway through to the kitchen. “Not the time.” But that makes her look sad, so he reaches into his satchel and pulls out the note she hasn’t seen yet, the one Len left at Barry’s lab. They bend over it like they did years ago around Valentine’s cards and notes exchanged in class, in a little conspiratorial huddle. Iris sounds like she did when she was sixteen, whispering, “So have you set up a date to see him yet?”

He sighs at her. “Don’t call it a _date,_ okay?” He rubs the back of his neck. “I’ll get nervous.”

She laughs, but there’s still a touch of worry in her eyes. She says, “We should talk about this, properly. And don’t tell Dad—” 

“Don’t tell me what?” Joe asks, putting the casserole dish down on the table, catching sight of the note as he leans over. “What you got there, Barr?”

Barry can only imagine the guilty look on his face, as he stares up at his foster father. Now he’s really getting déjà vu from his high school years. He considers shoving the note back into his bag, but that would look even worse. He knows too well that he’ll never survive a Joe interrogation. Might as well get to the point. “It’s from Len.” 

It’s a good thing Joe’s already put the pot down. He looks like he’s about to have an inconvenient heart attack. In a voice so quiet it’s alarming, he says, “You wanna explain that?”

“Nice one, Barr,” Iris says. “Got any more confessions you need to get off your chest?”

Oh yeah, they’ve both regressed to their teen years now. “Oh come on, Iris. It was always going to come out eventually that I’ve been—” 

“Seeing him?” Joe finishes. 

Barry knows that critical eyebrow raise. It’s the one designed to get a rise out of him. “That’s the wrong word,” he mutters.

Joe sits down at last, folding his arms across his chest. “Okay, then what’s the right one?”

“Dad,” Iris murmurs, laying a supportive hand on Barry’s arm.

Joe ignores her. “I’m listening, Barr. Tell me why you’ve been keeping things from me again.”

Barry closes his eyes and takes a breath, feeling his aggravated fist tapping lightly on the tabletop. He’s been here far too many times. It’s been a decade since Joe ceased to be his legal guardian, and still there are times when Barry remembers the moments of distrust more easily than Joe’s steady years of support. He hates that about himself.

When he opens his eyes, Joe’s still watching him, but his eyes have softened. “I wasn’t trying to keep anything from you, Joe.” Barry's gaze drops to the table. “Okay, yeah, we’ve met up. A couple of times, but they were practically accidents…” Beside him, Iris sounds like she’s trying to swallow a laugh at that. “Look, Joe—”

“You done?” Joe asks. Barry expects an angry barb, but it never comes. Instead, Joe turns his head to stare out of the window. 

Barry aims a confused look at Iris, who shrugs.

At last, Joe turns back. “We used to do a lot of this, remember? Getting each other’s backs up, while you hid things from me.” Barry opens his mouth to protest, but a hard look from Joe has him snapping it shut again. “Yeah, I know _now_ you had good reasons not to share everything with me, but… Eh. We got past it.” He glances down at the note. “And then you started dating _him._ For, what, three months? And I met him for a grand total of five minutes.” He snorts. “He was probably worried I’d recognize him from arresting him when he was twenty-something.”

“Well, that didn’t stop you from hating him.” Barry feels bad for the sulky outburst as soon as it’s out.

Joe sighs. “No, it didn’t. And I’m sorry for that.” 

Iris lets out a surprised cough. Joe aims a glare at her so terrifying she goes quiet. 

Then he reaches two hands out across the table. “Whatever the reason, you didn’t feel like you could tell me something, again. And then you got hurt.” He takes both of Barry’s hands in his. “You know I love you, don’t you, Barr?” 

Barry just nods, too bewildered to interrupt. 

Joe rubs both his thumbs along Barry’s, fixing his gaze on their linked hands. His face is painful to look at. “I spent two days sitting in STAR Labs thinking I was gonna lose you forever. Puts a different spin on things.”

Barry’s mouth has gone dry. He doesn’t want to say he never once thought about Joe’s feelings, but that’s about the size of it. “You’re not gonna lose me, Joe.”

“I wish I could believe that,” he murmurs. 

Giving Joe’s hands a squeeze before he lets go, Barry says, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

Joe nods slowly at him. “I get that you need your privacy, Barry. But if you’re gonna keep things to yourself, I need you to be careful. Don’t go rushing back into something you might regret.” 

Barry’s a little too overwhelmed to think right now, but he manages, “I’ll try.” 

Reaching across the table, Joe opens the casserole dish. “Right then. We’re gonna eat, and Barry’s gonna tell me at least _some_ of what’s going on with him and Leonard. Because lying to your family never got anyone anywhere good.”

Barry sighs, while Iris shoots him a tiny smirk that says she’s glad it’s not her in this position. 

But he tells Joe pretty much the whole story, from meeting Leonard at CC Jitters right up to the exchange of notes. (He carefully edits out tonight’s kiss on the rooftop, although Joe goes quiet anyway when Barry mentions his brief meetings with Len.) 

Honestly, he doesn’t really mind having to come clean. With everything that’s happened recently, it’s just nice to be reminded that his family has his back.

* * *

Len’s trying not to get too excited about the evening ahead of him. It is _not_ a date. It’s an overdue serious conversation about the future of his relationship—former relationship?—and it’s probably not going to be much fun. 

But at six o’clock he finds himself changing out of his Saints and Sinners jeans-and-leather-jacket work uniform anyway, pulling on a nice pair of slacks and an actual button-down shirt. 

He’s just fixing his cuffs with his favorite understated cufflinks, the ones with the tiny diamonds on them, when the doorbell sounds. Odd. He’s not due to meet Barry till eight, and he’s going to Barry’s place. Crossed wires, maybe. “Be right there,” he calls out, and goes to answer the door.

It’s not Barry.

Joe West is standing on the other side of his apartment door, his cop face so firmly in place that Len glances down, looking for handcuffs that aren’t there.

Len feels himself shrugging on his Captain Cold persona like a parka around his shoulders. “Detective West,” he drawls, with what he hopes is an impudent smirk. “What in the _world_ can I do for you?”

“Snart,” West says, like it pains him to acknowledge Len at all.

It’s one of the hardest things Len’s ever done. He steps aside, gesturing into the apartment. “Won’t you come in?” 

Incredibly, West does. Len watches his every move from the doorway—as he steps in, as his eyes roam the apartment, as he heads for the couch and pauses there almost awkwardly.

Len’s eyes are on the gun at the detective’s thigh, and the hand hovering near it. He steps into West’s field of view, hands spread in a gesture of peace. Bending down slowly, he removes his cold gun from under the coffee table and places it on top. “How about we both put our guns where everyone can see ‘em?” He lowers himself into an armchair. “Sit down, Detective, or this’ll be more uncomfortable for us both than I expect it’s already gonna be.”

Sighing, West nods and releases his gun from its holster, dropping it onto the table beside the cold gun, and sitting down.

 _Huh._ Len hadn’t expected the guy to follow through. “Go on then,” Len says. “Do your worst.”

West rolls his eyes. “Not until you wipe that smirk off and persuade me you’re taking this seriously.”

Now that the shock of the arrival has worn off, the strategy centers of Len’s brain are activating. A cop knows where he lives. Len’s already planning his house move. He doesn’t think Joe West would turn him in, but he _could._ Or he could do worse, if he’s not on the up-and-up. There are all kinds of ways he could make Len’s life hell. 

But fixing this can come later. “Oh, I’m dead serious, Detective.” Len folds one leg over the over, pulling his knee up to his hip. “Gun on the table or not, you could do some damage to me if you wanted to, and you’re motivated enough. Think I’ve spent enough time with Barry that I can be sure you’re not the kind of cop my father was, but you never can tell.”

It’s a tactical play, and Len knows it. He watches West’s eyes narrow—whether at the accusation of corruption, or the association with Lewis Snart, Len can’t tell. He doesn’t know this guy… except through Barry. His boyfriend’s fond stories of everything Joe West did for him growing up, the depth of trust he seems to have in his foster father, are the only reason Len’s not running. 

But West is not easily deterred. “You done with the chit-chat, Snart?” Len shrugs a shoulder, kind of curious to see where he’s going. “You put my son in danger.” West leans forward. “You _arranged_ to have him hurt. Tortured.”

“I’m aware.” Len hears his own voice come out flat.

He gets a stony look back from the cop. “I’ve left well enough alone, so far. Because you helped rescue him, but mostly because I thought Barry was smart enough to keep his distance after he found out who you were. I’m not so sure he is, now.” His glare intensifies. “Not with you trying to weasel your way back into his life.”

“Barry’s a grown man. He can decide for himself who he wants in his life.” Len spreads his hands in that same open gesture, but this time it's as much of a sham as everything else about him. “It’s all on the table now, Detective—he knows who I am. What he does with that information is up to him.”

“You’re manipulating him,” West growls.

Len couldn’t fight the smirk if he wanted to. “I think the word you’re looking for is _courting.”_

West slams his hand down on the coffee table, moving into Len’s space in the process. Len fights not to flinch away. “You’re gonna hurt him again, Snart. Even if you don’t mean to.” He takes a deep breath, visibly wrestling back control of his temper. “You given any thought to how your life with my son would work? A criminal and a CSI? Barry’d have to quit, or risk jail. The Flash and the boss of the Rogues? You know Barry’s too tender-hearted ever to take you in again. He’d rather see the city freeze.” 

Len bites down, hard, on a retort.

Sitting back against the couch in triumph, West says, “See, Snart? You get everything you want, and Barry has to live with the consequences. It’d be that way forever.”

Len feels his shoulders shrug. He hasn’t given much thought to that, actually, but he’s not admitting it to the good detective. “Think that’s up to Barry, don’t you?”

“No, Snart, half of it is up to you!” West jabs an angry finger in Len’s direction. “Have you even apologized for what you did? Have you done _anything_ to make this right, except making a play for Barry again like nothing ever happened?”

Lisa’s voice, echoing in his head. _What are you going to do to make this right?_

West is still ranting, and Len doesn’t know why he hasn’t thrown him out yet, but he lets him get it all out. “You weren’t there, the first few weeks, Snart. You swanned off wherever you went, and let the rest of us help him. God, he was a mess.” He takes a shaky breath. “It wasn’t just his injuries—those were fucked up enough, but… He wouldn’t eat. He had night terrors like I haven’t seen since he was thirteen.”

West’s eyes are glistening. Len swallows, no longer caring if it’s a tell.

And now the detective isn’t looking at Len like an enemy anymore. He might be looking at him like his son’s boyfriend. “He went through some serious trauma, Snart,” he says quietly. “And now he’s not acting like he understands the repercussions. Not when it comes to you.”

Len just looks at Joe. He wants to be pissed at him. He certainly was when the guy turned up. But all the sharp words Len was about to let rip have turned to dust in his mouth. 

Joe has let his head slump down against the couch back. “I could have handled you two being together, I think. If you’d been a regular criminal. But now…” He shakes his head. “I’ve been watching my boy run out into danger every night for three years. I can’t think about him going home to it, too.”

They sit in silence for a minute, staring at each other, till Len coughs away a dry throat. “I’ll take your views under advisement.”

“You do that.” Joe stands up. Len wonders when he started thinking of him by his first name. “You’re not wrong that Barry’s an adult. I can’t control him—shouldn’t try.” He looks Len dead in the eye. “But if you care about him, please, do the right thing. Not for me. For him.”

“Right,” Len croaks. He just needs this to be over now. He gets up, picking up the cold gun, holstering it at his thigh with a familiar click that should be much more reassuring than it is.

“I’ll see myself out,” Joe says, picking up his own gun. 

Len lets him go.

It’s still light outside. Len heads out to his balcony, breathing in slow lungfuls of cool evening air. It’s not close to eight o’clock, but he knows he can’t see Barry tonight. Not until he’s examined all the angles. 

The text he sends is only as long as it needs to be.

_I’m sorry. I need time to think._

Barry replies seconds later, with words that are so characteristically _him_ that Len could cry.

_Scarlet: Of course. Take all the time you need. We can reschedule for whenever you’re ready. Did something happen?_

He knows it’s petty. He gives into temptation anyway. 

_Ask your foster father._

Well, it’s not like Leonard Snart has ever been a good guy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More thanks to blueelvewithwings for excellent beta reading and plotting chat, and to RetroactiveCon for very helpful plotting chat too.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Barry's tired of listening to wise friends with his best interests at heart. Good idea or not, he's going to do what he wants to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not beta read because I was impatient and wanted a chapter out today for Reasons, but huge thanks to [blueelvewithwings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueelvewithwings/pseuds/blueelvewithwings) and [RetroactiveCon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RetroactiveCon/pseuds/RetroactiveCon) for constantly letting me bother them with snippets and being very encouraging.
> 
> See end notes for spoilery (very mild) content warnings.

Barry stares at his phone.

It’s been over a day since Len cancelled on him without a real explanation. Then he had another twelve-hour shift followed by a big fire downtown that meant donning the Flash suit when all he wanted was to go home and hide under his blankets. And now he's only more confused, as he stands in the Cortex trying to figure out a couple of short, sharp messages that are even more cryptic than Len usually gets.

Cisco is spinning on his chair, watching Barry with suspicious eyes. “You’re texting someone.”

“Iris,” Barry lies, as smoothly as he knows how. 

Cisco’s eyes are so narrow, Barry doesn’t know how he can see out of them. “Barry, you haven’t looked at an Iris-text like _that_ for years.”

Looking up from the screen, Barry’s flutter of nerves is replaced by a burst of irritation. What’s it got to do with Cisco who he’s texting? But the pointed silence gets to him a moment later. “Fine. I’m texting Leonard. Happy now?”

“Weirdly enough, no.” Cisco pushes out his chair with a squeak that echoes through the quiet Cortex, striding over to get a look at Barry’s phone, just as Barry shoves it into his pocket. “You wanna explain why you’re _texting_ the guy who handed you over to the Sadistic Psychics?”

That sounds a bit too much like Cisco is trying to give Barry's torturers a cutesy villain name. If he is, it’s not funny. “I don’t know, Cisco. Maybe because he's not just that.” He’s trying to snap at him, but it just comes out oddly sad. 

Barry looks up at Cisco's tight glare and has to step away. He ends up gazing at the Flash suit. If one more of his friends—or family—accuses him of hiding things, Barry’s going to let rip with everything he _has_ been keeping from them. Just to see their faces.

He hears Cisco take a breath and walk a few paces in the opposite direction, murmuring, “Sorry.”

When he turns around, Cisco is leaning against the wall, looking at Barry with more concern than anger. Sighing, Barry joins him there, letting his head drop back against the wall. “This shit got complicated,” he says to the ceiling.

Cisco snorts. “Couldn’t get more complicated.” 

“I'm sorry." There's touch of pleading in Barry's voice. "I just needed some privacy while I figured this out.” 

“But you didn’t think I’d approve." Cisco has the decency to make a sad face at the floor. "Okay, fair. Guess I haven’t been the most supportive when it comes to _him.”_

Barry raises an eyebrow. “You think? You hacked his social media profiles and looked up his criminal record.”

Cisco just spreads his hands in a ‘see?’ gesture that makes Barry chuckle. He nudges Barry’s foot with his own. “Are you getting back together?”

“I don’t know yet.” Barry shoves his hands in his pockets. “We haven’t talked much, and it took a while to get this far.” 

Cisco leans across to shoulder-bump him. “I promise to try not to judge. I'll do the friend thing. You know, where you’re meant to say ‘I hope you’ll be happy together!’ and watch as the friend walks cheerfully off the cliff? That.”

Barry lets out a startled laugh. “Oh, very non-judgemental.” Taking in Cisco’s still-worried eyes, he says, “I know… I need to think carefully before we start anything up again.”

“I’d say that’s the least you need to do,” Cisco mutters.

Barry runs a frustrated hand through his hair. Maybe it’s time his friends let him make his own bad decisions. “You wanna hear me say it, Cisco? You were right about him. He lied to me for months. And sure, he didn’t know it was _me_ he was betraying to those meta traffickers… but that doesn’t make it much better.” Even as Barry’s saying it, it’s still like he’s talking about someone else. Not Len. Definitely not Len-and-Barry. “Look, I get it. If I let him back into my life, I’m probably going to get hurt again, one way or another.” He puts a cautious hand on Cisco’s arm. “But I miss him. Can you at least try to understand that? As my friend?”

Cisco, who’s been staring intently at him through the whole of that little speech, cocks his head. “Great. Play the friend card. Now I _have_ to give you my blessing.”

Grinning, Barry squeezes Cisco’s arm. “Nah, you don’t. But you do have to trust that I can look after myself.” He raises an eyebrow for emphasis. “I’m a big boy. I can make my own mistakes.” 

“Fine,” Cisco grumbles, but that familiar smile is peeking through, coaxed out by Barry’s. Cisco points a stern finger. “But you tell me about it if you get back together, yeah? No more lies.”

That, Barry can do. Maybe that will even keep everyone a little bit safer than last time. And then maybe, he thinks before he can stop himself, he and Len can find a way to make this work after all. “You got it, Cisco. Care to seal that deal over a Jitters latte or two?”

Cisco grins. “Thought you’d never ask.” He skips back to his chair, grabbing the coat slung over the back. “Oh, and you can tell Snart from me that if he lies to you again, he’ll be looking at the business end of his own gun.”

Barry snorts. “Is that right?” 

_“Damn_ right. I made that thing. I can take it away from him again.”

If it came down to it, Barry might bet on an angry Cisco in that fight. 

“Oh, one sec,” Barry says, feeling his phone buzzing in his pocket. Pulling it out, he stares at the screen, trying to make sense of what he’s reading. “Actually, Cisco, can I get a rain check? There's something I need to deal with.”

Cisco shrugs. “No worries. I’m behind on some work on the STAR Labs satellite, anyway.” He pats Barry on the back. “Everything okay?”

Barry’s already heading out of the Cortex. “No, actually. I have to go kill Joe.”

He just catches Cisco’s strained, “Uh… Have fun with that!” before he speeds out of the building towards the house where he grew up.

* * *

Iris has only stopped by her dad’s to drop off a bottle of Eddie’s mead. He’s been brewing it in the linen closet, and getting it out of there is really a public service to everyone. She pretends to mind more than she does. It’s nice that he has a hobby that’s not hitting bags. 

Given that it’s only four in the afternoon, she’s expecting her Dad’s house to be empty. She definitely doesn’t expect to open the door and walk into a blazing row in the middle of the living room, with Barry squaring up to her dad like she hasn’t seen since the last time he ran away to see Henry, and that was over ten years ago.

“I cannot _believe_ you!” Barry yells, as she shuts the door behind her.

“Barr,” her dad is saying, in his nervous ‘Dad knows he isn’t actually right this time’ voice. Iris heard that voice a lot after Barry became the Flash, when her dad was struggling to come to terms with the idea that he had never believed in his son, when he was telling the truth all along. Her dad sounds nearly as guilty now as he did then, holding out a placating hand. Barry can’t see it from where he's glaring at the fireplace. “I only did what I thought was best for you.” 

“Guys,” Iris tries to interrupt, taking a step towards the living room. No one reacts to her. 

Barry is starting to pace up and down the living room with that nervous energy that never leads to anything good. “And why do you always get to decide what's best for me, Joe?” 

Her dad runs a hand down his face. “Barry, listen. You don’t understand—”

Iris drops her purse. _“Guys!”_

Barry turns to her, nostrils flaring. “Did you know he did this?”

Iris rolls her eyes to the ceiling. “Guys, calm the hell down so I can listen. Barry, did I know _what?”_

Barry throws out a hand in her dad’s direction. “Did you know he went to talk to Len? Without my— Without asking me if it was okay!”

_Oh, God._

Crossing the room, she lays a hand on Barry’s shaking shoulder.

“Iris,” Dad warns, in a voice that strongly suggests she should leave them to it.

She doesn’t care what he wants. “Come on, Barr,” she says, and leads him outside.

In the back yard, she lets him get the inevitable angry reaction out of the way before she tries to make him talk. He wanders off to the end of the lawn, picking up rocks to throw at the apple tree. It’s what he does when he’s pretending he isn’t crying. 

After a minute, he shuffles back to the deck and drops onto the steps that lead down to the patio, his face still turned towards the tree. She sits down behind him. “What happened?”

“Joe went to Len’s place and told him to leave me alone,” he says, eventually. He leans back into her, as if desperate for support. “At least, that’s what I got from the couple of texts Len sent.” He runs a hand through his hair. “Joe didn’t even try to deny it.”

She sighs. “Okay, that’s a bit much even for Dad.”

“Yeah.”

She drops her head onto his shoulder. They’re quiet for a minute, watching the late, soft rays of sunlight filtering through the fence posts. 

Barry takes a deep breath in and sighs it out. “I really thought he’d learned to trust me.”

Iris rubs his arm. “You’re not going to like this, Barr, but you need to see it from his point of view.” He turns his head slightly, ready to glare at her. “I’m not saying what he did was right, and I’ll help you drag an apology out of him. But you heard him yesterday. He’s scared for you.” She sighs. “I’m a little scared for you too.”

Barry has turned right around now, watching her with wide eyes. “Don’t tell me you think he did the right thing.”

She shakes her head hard. “No. And I’ll support you whatever happens.”

He reaches up a hand to wipe his eyes. “Would you really, though? Support me, if Len and I wanted to start things up again?” 

She pauses just a little too long. She could never lie to him. 

“Got it,” Barry mutters to the yard.

“Don’t be mad, Barr,” she coaxes. “If it’s really what you want, of course I've got your back. And if anyone’s inventive enough to make it work, it’s you. But he _hurt_ you. And you keep putting off having a real conversation with him about that. You’re acting so weird, Barry. It’s like you…”

Barry turns his face back to the deck beneath them. Very quietly, he says, “Like I don’t want it to end.” 

She drops her head back onto his shoulder.

There’s a moment more quiet, and then he adds, “He wants me back.”

That doesn't surprise Iris, but at least Barry has realized it too. “Has he said as much?”

“No, but it’s obvious.”

She taps Barry on the shoulder. He doesn’t turn around. “Barry... Has he apologized for what he did?” Another shake of his head, and anger flares in her gut at Leonard Snart. Iris even likes him. She’d even be okay with things working out between him and her best friend, if either of them looked like they were thinking clearly about all this. But she asked Len, that day at Saints and Sinners, to tell Barry he was sorry. It had even seemed like he was listening. And that was _weeks_ ago.

 _They’re both doing it,_ she thinks. _Trying to reset things to the way they were before._

Carefully, because pissing Barry off now would not be ideal, she asks, “Have you thought about taking some time away from him to think things through?”

He takes a damp, shaky breath. “I don’t know…” He doesn’t finish, and she doesn’t push him any further.

They sit in silence a few minutes longer before she gets up, offering him her hand. “Come on. Let’s go force my dumbass dad to apologize.” She snorts. “He owes you at least a month of first choice of movies at family night.”

“A year,” Barry mutters, but he’s trying hard not to smile as he takes her hand.

* * *

Joe says he’s sorry, if a little begrudgingly. But Barry doesn’t stay. He doesn’t want to talk. He doesn’t want to _think._

So he runs. Not thinking.

He runs without a destination, without the first clue where he’s going. Not thinking.

Until he finds himself outside an apartment block on the east side of town, speeding up the chrome and glass stairs that would always have been faster for him, even if the elevator hadn’t been broken, and buzzes the doorbell. Not thinking.

If he starts thinking, he’ll start listening to his brain over his heart. And that’s exactly what he doesn’t want.

“Hi,” whispers a wide-eyed Len, breathless in the doorway.

“I don’t care,” Barry says, crowding him a little.

Len steps backwards, letting him in. “What don’t you care about, Barry?”

Barry takes another step inside the apartment. Letting him lead the dance, Len backs through his hall archway into the living room. Barry says, “I don’t care what they think. Any of them. Joe, Cisco, not even Iris—not right now."

Len stops walking as Barry moves closer, watching Barry like he’s fighting a battle inside himself. “Is that right?”

“Yeah. It is.”

Eyes turned to the floor, Len asks, “What _do_ you want then, Barry?”

The most important thing in the world, right now, is that Barry doesn’t think. So he doesn’t. He clutches at Len, wrapping impatient arms around him.

Len grasps him back, just as hard and desperate.

The kiss they share is hot and frantic, and Barry knows exactly where it’s leading, and he doesn’t make a single move to stop it.

“I want _you,_ Len,” Barry whispers, when they finally part.

Len’s tongue flicks out to lick at an inflamed lip. He’s staring at Barry. “That may not be the wisest idea we’ve ever had.”

With his hands still around Len’s shoulders, Barry’s eyes trace the ribbon of exposed skin where neck meets shoulder, where a black line of tattoo peeks out from under his shirt. He kisses that spot, enjoying the pleased warmth in his stomach when Len closes his eyes and _melts_ under his touch. Barry lets his fingers run down Len’s back under his shirt, and murmurs, “Didn’t I mention I don’t care?”

“Fuck, Scarlet,” Len breathes.

A shot of lightning-pure adrenaline runs through Barry, chased by a low shiver. Hearing that nickname from Len’s lips, the one Captain Cold calls the Flash every time they clash over fired shots and puns-as-flirting, is as delightful as sin. “That’s the idea,” Barry says, his hands cupping the back of Len’s head as he kisses him again.

They dance that one-two step all the way to the bedroom, Barry stepping forward with his hands looped around Len’s neck, Len walking backwards, his eyes dark with longing. It’s the sight Barry’s been waiting for, for weeks, and he’s determined to appreciate it now. 

Barry is expecting the sex to be passionate and heavy, like so many of their long days in bed, before plotting and kidnapping ruined everything. But Len is so slow, so gentle it almost hurts. He kisses Barry softly in the bedroom doorway, and again on the bed, a hand caressing Barry’s face as if he’s made of fine crystal glass. He carefully removes Barry’s cardigan and shirt, meeting his eyes, his own a little hard to read. Longing and passion and… sadness. And Barry knows he should think before he says it, but there are good reasons he’s not thinking tonight. He runs his own hand along the line of Len’s jaw. “I love you,” he tells Len.

Len stares at Barry, hardly breathing. His eyes drop to the blankets. He can’t quite look at Barry when he says it back. “I love you too.”

And now Barry can’t breathe either.

Barry falls in love easily, says the words three weeks into a relationship, and never takes offence if the other person is a little more reticent. With Len it always seemed like more than that, like a promise Len could never quite offer. Barry would have expected the words to come reluctantly, when they came. But they'e clear and strong, like all the truth Len could never tell him before. As if all their lies have fallen away, all the costumes, all the dissembling, and they can finally, truly be themselves with each other.

When Len looks back up, there’s something sure and steady in his eyes that Barry has never seen there before. And Barry believes him.

Right now, there’s nothing Len could say that he wouldn’t believe.

* * *

From the moment Len is kissed awake by Barry the next morning, he knows this is too good to be true.

“Good morning,” Barry whispers, grinning, when they remember they need to pull apart to breathe.

Len stretches his arms above his head. “I’ll say.” He turns over to find a steaming mug of coffee on his nightstand, and flips back around to stare at Barry. “Are you real, Scarlet?” he murmurs, reaching out to run a hand through Barry’s hair.

Barry laughs. “About as real as the Flash and Captain Cold.” 

Something about that hurts, but Len doesn’t know what. 

A grinning Barry hasn’t noticed, leaning over to kiss him again. “But more importantly, as real as Barry Allen and Leonard Snart.”

Len watches his speedster, as Barry turns over to reach for his own coffee. He’s framed by the early morning sunlight. Lit up like a fucking angel. Perfect in every way.

“It’s a good thing I’ve got Saturday _and_ Sunday off,” Barry says, turning back to curl into Len. Why is his deeply contented sigh painful to Len’s ears? “Because that’s how long I plan to stay right here.”

“Mm,” Len says, still with no idea why he’s being so non-committal. That should sound great. It should sound… perfect.

Barry reaches up his head to kiss Len, who leans in obligingly. “We could make pancakes,” Barry suggests, with an adorable little grin.

“Okay,” Len says, because there’s no reason to say no.

Barry flashes up in a crackle of lightning.

It takes all of Len’s strength not to flinch away.

The speedster gazes down at him like Len is the sun in his sky, offering Len a hand. “Come on then,” he says.

Len takes the Flash’s hand.

And makes a decision. Two days. He can give Barry two days. After everything he’s done to this wonderful man who deserved none of it, Len can give him one good weekend. 

He snakes an arm around Barry’s shoulder, dancing a few steps away with him. _“The way you sip your tea,”_ he sings as they dance. _“The memory of all that—no, no, they can’t take that away from me...”_

Barry chuckles, delighted, as he lets Len lead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's no actual sex here, but there's pre-smut and references to it. If you want to skip the foreplay, skip from "The most important thing in the world, right now, is that Barry doesn’t think" and come back at "Right now, there’s nothing Len could say that he wouldn’t believe." But you will miss Barry and Len telling each other they love each other.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Turns out, one nearly-perfect weekend can't solve all your problems.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks so much to RetroactiveCon for stepping in and being an excellent substitute beta reader.

“Yeah, I know the Motorcar.” Barry stares doubtfully through the greasy window at the plastic booths inside. The diner is practically across the street from CCPD—of course he knows it. “You’re finally less worried about laying low, and the first place you want to take me is a crappy diner?”

Len’s eyebrows go up, as if Barry’s said something mean. “Let me tell you,” he says very intently, “about why I love this place.” And he takes Barry’s hand and leads him inside.

They find a cool, dark cave of a booth in the back. Len is already looking thoughtful as the waitress brings over their coffees, setting an iced sugary monstrosity in front of Len and a black coffee on Barry’s side. “Thanks, Maura,” Len says.

Glancing approvingly at Barry, she darts Len a wink before leaving them to it.

Barry blinks at her retreating white apron bow. “You know this place well, I see.”

“Yup.” He taps two fingers against his chin like he’s trying to decide something. “My grandfather used to bring me here.”

Barry settles back in the booth, listening. Len hasn’t opened up to him much about things like this. But that just leads to sad thoughts of how much they’ve lied to each other, and he pushes those away.

Len’s voice is a little guarded when he asks, “You know anything about Lewis Snart?”

Where has Barry heard that name before? Oh, right. Len’s father—he came up in Len’s file. All Barry can remember is that he was a criminal too. “Not much.”

Len’s jaw is set hard as he reaches out to stir his coffee slowly with the stripy straw. “Dear old Dad taught me everything I knew. A fair few things I wish I didn’t. But for a few decent years, Grandad got me out of his house whenever he could.” 

That’s actual nostalgia in Len’s smile. Barry smiles back, thinking of Joe. “Was this before Lisa was born?”

Len takes a sip from his plastic cup and makes a face. “Ugh, terrible. Just how I like it.” Barry laughs, and Len grins. “Yeah, mostly before baby sis came along. Just me and Grandad against a shitty world.” He glances up at the window, towards the police station across the street. “After he died, I learned the tricks of my trade here. But first, there were milkshakes, and burgers, and long evenings when I just tried to keep him talking as late as he was willing to keep me out. This place was safe.” He settles back with a fading trace of the softest smile Barry’s ever seen from him. “Your turn.”

The tiny story is intoxicating, and Barry wants to ask for more. It feels like a key to the safe that holds his maybe-boyfriend’s heart. But self-revelation is like a long game for Len. And hey, they have all the time in the world.

So he just smiles over at Len. “What do you want to know?”

Len shrugs. “Tell me something you haven’t yet.”

Barry hesitates. Unlike Len, he’s an open book. Len knows about Barry’s years growing up with the Wests, and why he became a CSI, and the bare bones of what happened to his parents. Barry has even told him about Flashpoint, and how fixing it reset the world beyond what he could deal with, for a while. 

To buy himself thinking time, Barry takes a glug of caustic coffee—and gets a flood of sense memory. He’s thirteen years old, stumbling through the door of the last diner before Iron Heights. Kind waiters taking pity on the bedraggled kid, sneaking him a polystyrene mug of lukewarm coffee, the best thing he’d tasted all week, because it meant he was about to see…

“The year I turned thirteen, I spent almost every weekend running away to see my dad. And I literally mean running. It’s not like Joe would give me money, when he knew I’d only spend it on the bus there, so I would just take off on foot.” Barry clears a suddenly dry throat. “I was so angry back then. All that raw energy? I didn’t know what to do with it. I didn’t know how to _escape_ it. Running the three miles to Iron Heights was my way out.” 

Instinctively, Barry looks up. For so much of his life, people have heard his stories and stopped listening. He never wanted to know whether they didn’t believe him, or just didn’t care. But Len’s eyes are watching him now, sharp and intense. Taking Barry seriously.

Encouraged that Len doesn’t think he’s talking crap, Barry goes on. “Running like that, for hours at a time… It was so exhilarating. But safe, too, you know?”

“Can’t say I do,” Len says wryly. He's watching Barry like he never wants him to stop talking. Or never wants this day to end. “So tell me.” 

Barry settles back against his gluey plastic seat, takes another sip of cheap coffee, and tells Len what it’s like to be the Flash.

* * *

It’s after midnight when they clatter back into the apartment, Len trying to shush an excited Barry (“I do have neighbours, you know”) and then telling him he’s cute. In his own defense, watching a speedster trying to stop giggling like a schoolkid is adorable. 

Coffee at the Motorcar led to dinner at Barry’s favorite pizza place, where he said his parents used to take him years ago, and then Len had the bright idea of Saints and Sinners. It was too charming, watching Barry’s wide-eyed nerves giving way to impish delight when he realised no one there was going to out him as the Flash.

“Nightcap?” Len asks.

Barry wrinkles his nose. “Does nothing for me.” He brightens. “Oh, but I don’t suppose you’ve got any hot chocolate, do you?”

Len chuckles. He’s not going to tell him again how cute he is. They’ll be here all night. “Sure. Sounds even better than the other kind of drink.”

Barry is the one who ends up at the stove, stirring milk and cocoa with the poise of a real chef, while Len finds supplies. “Hang on, I think I’ve got some mini marshmallows around here…”

“Oh, let me get them,” Barry says—

—and flashes ahead of him to the sideboard.

For a chilling moment, Len is trapped between the cupboard door and the wall.

Barry laughs. “Oops. Sorry!”

A shudder spasms through Len’s shoulders. The oblivious speedster is looming over him, looking like he’s about to take the opportunity to _kiss_ him. Len shoves him away. “Get off. Get away from me.” 

Before he can process what he’s doing, Len has stumbled out onto his fire escape. Through the open window behind him, he’s vaguely aware of Barry turning off the stove. Len sinks into his deckchair, clutching the arms. Slow breaths. In, one, two, three. Out, one, two, three.

Barry stays inside for a while, probably giving him space. That’s good… maybe. It’s an awful internal conflict, that longing for comfort from the one person he needs to stay away. 

Eventually, a quiet shadow in a red cardigan steps—slowly—out onto the fire escape. He hands Len a hot chocolate piled high with mini marshmallows. Len accepts it, wrapping his hands around comforting warmth. 

“I’m sorry I scared you,” Barry murmurs.

Len clears his throat. “Not your fault.” His eyes are fixed on the Central City skyline stretching out ahead of them. He can just about make out the dark, clawed tower of STAR Labs in the distance, casting a shadow over everything. 

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Barry asks, more quietly.

Len rubs at his eyes with a thumb and forefinger. He must be getting tired. “No.” 

Barry wilts a little beside him, and stops asking. A quiet, insistent voice in the back of Len’s head wants to know why he can’t just push a little more. Sighing, Len reaches out a hand, and Barry takes it. 

He still has one more perfect day to give Barry. So they head back inside, and they curl up on the couch and drink hot chocolate, and chatter about nothing. And if Barry notices that Len’s a little quieter than usual, he doesn’t say anything.

* * *

Len wakes up on Sunday determined to keep things low-key and light. That even works out, for a few hours.

In the afternoon, he takes Barry to a spot on the riverbank, just out past Keystone. The sun is setting over a distant cornfield by the time Len has finished telling Barry stories about how he brought Lisa down here to play, when she was tiny and he was a teenager. Years later, he and Mick would come out here to count the score from their early jobs, far from prying eyes and cop cars. 

Beside him, Barry has gone quiet. Len bumps his shoulder. “You good?” 

“Yeah,” Barry says distantly. He’s playing with a blade of grass. “Your dad was a criminal, too, right?”

Well, that came out of nowhere. Len raises his eyebrows at the ground. “Read my file, huh?”

“Had to sometime, didn’t I?” Barry stretches out in the grass. “Then you mentioned him yesterday, and I remembered where I’d seen his name before.”

Best to stick to the safer side of this subject. Len lets his voice slip into a drawl. “Lewis was in prison half my life, on and off. When he wasn’t, he took us on jobs.” The deepening frown lines on Barry’s face say he’s clocked that Len means Lisa too. Preempting any pesky questions, Len jumps forward in time. “We got pretty good at it, over the years, as you might have noticed by now.” He completes the conscious picture of himself with a nasty smirk. “There’s your supervillain origin story, Flash. That what you wanted?”

Barry leans up on his arm. “Actually, I’d rather get to know a bit more about Leonard Snart.”

Len lies back in the grass, trying not to sigh into the blue sky. If Barry wants to wring more truth out of Len, that’s his right. After months of lies, Len owes him. “Then ask.”

“How old were you when your father first took you on jobs?”

“Ten.” Len’s used to putting on this story like armor, between him and anyone trying to get near. Never had it used against him before.

Barry’s voice gets quieter. “How did you feel about it?”

“How do you think I felt?” Len snaps. 

A hand reaches over to meet his, a bridge between them. “Trust me,” Barry says.

He doesn’t want to. It’s his story. His choice, whether to wield it like a weapon or lock it away. But it’s Barry. Len makes himself take his hand. “It sucked,” he murmurs. “Feel free to imagine the things a man has to do to get his ten-year-old son to learn how to break into houses. How he gets him to _kill_ when he’s fifteen. And then how he… repeats that with his daughter, twelve years later.” 

It’s more than he’s told anyone he’s dated before. He’s distantly aware of the part of his brain trying to work out how Barry has pulled the rug out from under him like this.

Barry’s face is on just the wrong side of _pity_. Len lets the drawl creep back into his voice. “Let’s be clear, Flash. I love this game now. I love being the best at it.”

“So you’ve said.” Barry’s tone suggests he doesn’t believe a word of it.

Len stares at him, still wondering what this man is doing to him, and how. “Okay, I used to love it. Guess things change.”

There’s a stretch of silence before Barry breathes out hard. “I’ve told you what happened to my mom, but I don’t think I’ve told you much about how it… affected me.” The line of Barry’s throat ripples as he swallows. “When she was killed, right in front of me? I was eleven.”

“Shit,” is all Len can think of to say, turning his head to watch Barry’s distant eyes, fixed on a point a decade and a half in the past. He squeezes Barry’s hand.

“Trauma changes you, but it’s different every time.” Barry says to the sky. He seems to be going somewhere with this. Len listens. “It’s easy to miss what it’s doing to you, when you’re in the middle of it. Right?”

Len hears himself say, “You mean like after you’ve been tortured because the guy you’re dating sold you out?”

“Yeah,” Barry whispers. He turns his head to give Len a meaningful look. “Why were you so afraid of me last night?”

Oh, so now he’s pushing. “You’re _chillingly_ powerful, Barry. I’ve seen that time after time, when we’ve faced off. You’re scary enough when I’ve got the cold gun pointed at you. But in my home…” He laughs, bitter and tired. 

“That’s why you did what you did.” Barry’s gaze is fixed on Len, and it makes him want to run. “Arranged for me to be taken out of the way, where I couldn’t hurt you or…” He sighs. “Lisa.”

But there are some places Len isn’t letting Barry lead him. He snarls, “Would you _stop_ trying to make excuses for me? Doesn’t matter how powerful you are. I still shouldn’t have done what I did.”

“I’m not. You had no excuse to hurt me.” Sadness has crept into Barry’s face, deep and distant, and Len just wants to help, but he can’t. He’s the one who put it there. “But context matters. And there’s a lot of it between us, now.” 

“Guess so.” Len’s suddenly so tired, talked into a corner he doesn’t know how to get out of. But it’s just Barry, Len tells himself. He’s safe… 

He really doesn’t want to know if Barry is afraid of him, too.

Barry sighs. “I’ve been so focused on what I wanted, how I didn’t want to talk about what’s happened between us, that I forgot there’s two of us in this relationship.”

“I don’t matter,” Len growls, sitting up. “I’m just the one who put you in this situation. The shit you’re going through now is my f—”

“Len,” Barry interrupts patiently, “please shut up.”

So he does, folding his legs underneath him, giving Barry thinking time. It’s not like Len disagrees with anything he’s saying. He just wanted the rest of the day before either of them had to deal with it. Just one happy weekend.

Very slowly, Barry sits up. “We have to stop trying to go back to the way things were before.”

“Can’t go home again…” The truth of that sits like a stone in Len’s gut. He turns to look at Barry. “We need to talk.”

Barry frowns at him. “I thought that’s what we were doing.”

There’s so much hurt in Barry’s eyes. Len wants to comfort him, hold him, kiss him. This time, he forces himself not to rush into any of that. “Not now. We both need a little time to think.” Len tilts his head in Barry’s direction. “Right?”

Barry turns away from him. Smiling sadly out across the river, he puts down the blade of grass. “Slowing me down, Len?”

“It’s what I do.” 

Nodding, Barry lets go of Len’s hand.

And breaks his heart.

* * *

It’s three weeks before Barry sees Len again. They’re some of the hardest weeks he can remember in a long time.

He asks Caitlin for the number of a therapist who treats metas. Dr. Harford turns out to be pretty good. Barry doesn’t tell him outright that he’s the Flash, but he tells him everything else.

_Everything._

Dr. Harford doesn’t object when Barry cries in his office. 

“You were kidnapped and tortured,” he reminds Barry, when Barry complains that he shouldn’t be crying. “You’re going to have some reactions to that. You’re entitled to all of them.”

Barry turns his head to look out of the window. The office is on the tenth floor, and the Central City skyline is stunning from up here. He thinks he can see Len’s apartment building. “Even the ‘total denial’ feelings, when I thought trying to recapture my pre-betrayal-and-kidnapping relationship was a good idea?”

“Even those.”

Reflecting on the doctor's previous comment, Barry scoffs. “They only had me for two days.”

Dr. Harford taps his pen on his chin for a few seconds, then points it at Barry. “And in those two days, how many times did they invade your mind? And how close to killing you did they come?”

As he turns back to the window, Barry feels himself start to shake.

Dr. Harford doesn’t object to that either.

He spends the rest of those weeks with his friends and family. Playing video games with Cisco, swapping banter and eating chips. Hovering around Caitlin’s medical station a bit aimlessly, while she sighs and tells him not to get underfoot, and hugs him when she notices he’s sad. Watching TV with Iris and Eddie, curled up on their sofa, remembering what it’s like to feel safe.

That evening, Iris must see something in Barry’s face. She says, “You could call him.” 

Barry nods at the TV. “When I’m ready.”

Her smile is sad, but it’s proud.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters to go: the one I've been calling 'the Talk', and the fluffy epilogue that these guys deserve.


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Len and Barry need to talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The penultimate chapter.

Barry asks for space. Len gives it to him. Three weeks of it, in the end. 

It hurts. 

Len does the right thing anyway.

In the meantime, he finds himself trying to work out what the hell has happened to his life. Somewhere along the way, his love for the game, the score, _thieving_ has drifted away like rose petals on the surface of a lake. 

He gives the Rogues a bonus and tells them to scram for a while. Axel, Hartley and the other late-joiners don’t need to be told twice. Lisa and Mick, not so much.

Lisa yawns, lazing back in her chair, while Len resists the urge to tell her to take her boots off their only table. “I might head back to Gotham,” she muses. 

“Cold this time of year,” Mick calls over from the couch. “Nah, Central’s more my speed for now.” 

Meanwhile, Lisa is giving Len a knowing look. “You’ll figure it out,” she says, more gently than he’s strictly comfortable with.

“Take out and TV tonight, boss?” Mick asks, still not bothering to turn around.

Len raises his eyes to the grubby ceiling—they’re fooling no one. But he doesn’t object to a little company.

With little else to do, he finds himself at the Safe Metas Project house more and more. At least they find ways to keep him useful. One day, Sofía catches him as he’s wandering in. She removes her head from under a pile of paperwork that Len really hopes she isn’t going to give to him, and says, “Leonard. Got a second?” 

“Sure.” He leans back against the reception counter, folding one leg over the other. “What can I do for you, boss?”

She eyes him for a moment. Len’s only been volunteering a couple of months, but Sofía and the others have started to trust him with more responsibility. Still won’t leave him alone with metas, but he figures he’s a long way from earning that right. But a couple of weeks ago he brought his personal, stolen copy of his CCPD file to Sofía and said, “All yours, boss. Make of it what you will.” She’s been kinder to him ever since. That’s the opposite of what he expected, given some of what’s in that file.

Now, Sofía is tapping a hand thoughtfully on the counter. “What are you doing with your life, Leonard?”

He snorts. “This a pep talk? ‘Cause, no offence, but I heard it all already in juvie.”

She grins and shakes her head. “No. I meant, are you going back to your… main occupation? When you’re done with us?”

There’s something in the way she’s looking at him. It hits him like a shot of ice to the heart. She _knows._ What Len did to the Flash is not in his CCPD file—Barry has kept his name out of it. But of course Sofía has figured out that there’s a reason for his new attachment to this place. Maybe one of the metas said something… 

He runs his hand back and forth along his side of the counter. “Not planning to be done with you guys anytime soon.”

She smiles. “Good.” Pushing a file across the counter, she says, “Take a look at this.” She pauses with her hand on the file. “Content warning.”

He nods, and opens the file.

It’s full of case notes on trafficked metas, some of them rescued from halfway across the country. A lot that they haven't managed to get out yet.

Len’s seen some terrible things done to people in his time. He’s _done_ a lot of those things. But he’s never seen anything like this. He doesn’t think he’s ever felt so angry about man’s inhumanity to man—to metahuman—as he does looking at these pictures, these stories. Trafficking. Exploitation. Illegal human experiments. There are _children_ in these pages, kidnapped and beaten and… worse.

They’re people, and they’re helpless and alone. 

Like Barry was.

Len slams the file shut. “You want me to do something about it.” It’s not a question.

She’s watching him with a strange look. Something like pride. “Let’s talk about it,” she says.

* * *

The weeks drag on for Barry, with no contact from Len. But he asked for space, and Len is giving it to him, so he can hardly complain.

He keeps going to therapy. 

And then, one unexpected evening, Len shows up at his apartment. In true Leonard Snart style.

Barry raises an eyebrow at him over the back of his couch. “Breaking in, Cold? Really?”

Len glances back at the door like he didn’t even realise he’d done that. “Surprised, Flash? Really?”

They share the kind of grin that wouldn’t be out of place in the field. All in a rush, Barry can’t believe how much he’s missed this. Missed him. It’s wonderful… until Len sighs. “We need to talk.”

Barry’s been expecting this for three weeks, but it hurts anyway. “Yeah. We do.”

Len’s step forward is too cautious. For a minute, Barry worries he’s already ruined everything. But then Len takes another step, reaching out. “Come somewhere with me.”

Barry takes his hand, rubbing his thumb over the callouses along the thumbs that are nothing to do with Len’s work as a thief. They’re from playing guitar, a revelation that gave Barry such a thrill when Len admitted it. When it comes to his thief, Barry finds the truth more delightful than any Captain Cold simulacrum ever could be. “Okay,” Barry says. “Where?”

Len tilts his head. “...I don’t know. I thought about the lakeside, but that’d just sully our date spot.”

Okay, so not the woods outside Keystone either. Definitely not Jitters. Barry shrugs. “The docks?” When Len blinks at him, he says, “Well, it’s not like they can get any _more_ depressing.”

Len is giving him an uncommon look of respect. “Sure. Bike’s downstairs.”

Barry grins.

“What?”

“We don’t need the bike.” Barry can't help his chuckle of anticipation. “Oh, you’re going to love this.”

About three seconds later, he deposits Len at the edge of the dock. He wobbles as he tries to get his balance back, looking like a kid who just rode the world’s biggest rollercoaster and can’t decide if he wants to whoop or throw up. He points an accusing finger at Barry. “You could do that the _whole_ time we’ve been together, and you waited this long?”

“I had a feeling you’d like that.” Barry jumps off the jetty, setting off towards the bank of rocks that leads down towards the water’s edge.

“Hold up,” Len says with a wry half-smile. He scratches his head. “You, uh, wanna see something cool?”

“Sure.” 

Beckoning, Len points behind them, towards the dark space beneath the docks, hidden in shadow. There’s a panel in a wooden beam there, obvious now that Barry’s looking at it, but easily missed. 

Len tilts his head. “I need a promise this won’t get back to CCPD.”

Barry’s too curious not to agree. “Fine.” At Len’s raised eyebrow, he rolls his eyes for effect. “I _promise.”_

Removing the panel, Len tugs at something. It turns out to be a blue sports bag. He replaces the panel, drops to the ground with it, and pats the space beside him. “Sit.”

As Len starts retrieving items from the bag, Barry sits down, skin prickling. He’s sitting close enough to touch Len, but he doesn’t know if he should. “What is it?”

“Something of a go-bag,” Len says. “Docks are an important place of _business_ for the Rogues. Mick and I have always stashed things out here, for emergencies. Cash, tech, clothes…” He glances up at Barry. “Might as well see if it’s all still here.”

It leaves Barry momentarily speechless, watching Len rustling through the bag. He never expected him to be this honest. But here he is, grinning as he holds up a small packet of cash, showing it off to Barry. “Not too _much_ cash,” Len says, in the tone of someone teaching a class on becoming an effective master thief. “Just enough to help out in a hurry.”

Dim light falls in rows through the slats of the dock above them. Barry looks up. Somewhere up there is a warehouse where, weeks and weeks ago now, Barry came seeking the Rogues and ran straight into Psyche and Ghoul. Len follows his gaze and glances away again, back to the bag. Here, deep in the shadow of the dock, it’s a little too dark to see Len’s expression clearly. Barry wonders what he’d see there, if it wasn’t. Regret?

He doesn’t know how to start this conversation.

“Kinda wish I’d brought a picnic,” Len says, smirking a little.

“Don’t do that,” Barry murmurs, and Len nods like he’s sorry.

Far out along the river, Barry can make out the headlights of a little boat, lighting up the darkness. Just a little.

“I waited for you, you know,” Len is taking out a piece of tech that looks suspiciously like a breach extrapolator, placing it on the growing pile of odds and ends beside him. “Our last-minute lakeside picnic. On the night you were… I waited for you.”

The date Barry missed. Because he’d been kidnapped. God, he’d forgotten all about that. 

He has no idea why, but he starts to laugh.

Len rolls his eyes to the dock. “Sure. Laugh it up. Very funny.”

But it _is_ kind of funny, imagining Len waiting for him at the lake, just after setting up the Flash, with no idea why Barry wasn’t coming. Achingly sad, too… even if Len deserved it, a little bit. “Yeah, well, I wish I could have been there.” Barry winces at the sarcastic tone, but it’s too late to take it back.

But Len sounds deadly serious when, softly, he says, “I’ve never dated anyone like you, Barry.” He raises his eyebrows at the bag. “Mostly just had a lot of one-night stands... and let’s not forget the anonymous encounters behind the dumpsters at Saints and Sinners. _So_ romantic.” He’s examining a bright Hawaiian shirt that has to be Mick’s. “And then there was you. Can you get any more cliché-cute than meeting over mixed-up drinks in a coffee shop? But everything about you was just that perfect, Scarlet.”

Barry wants nothing more than to give in to the romantic little thump-thump of his heart at that admission, to grab Len and kiss him. But it isn’t all true, and lying is the worst thing they can do now. “It wasn’t perfect.” He glances down. There are a lot of fakes among the real STAR Labs pieces on Len’s little pile of tech. “It was an illusion.”

Len inclines his head towards Barry. “Not all of it.”

Barry hopes that’s true. But after the three weeks he’s spent thinking about it, the reality of what came between them looms dark and dangerous, like a rift. “We both lied about a lot.” 

Len’s head snaps around to look at Barry. _“Guilty.”_ His hands are fidgeting with a gadget Barry doesn’t recognize, clicking it open and shut, open and shut. “That day we met at Jitters. The first thing you told me was that you worked for CCPD. I should have walked away right then.” He glances up at Barry, unmasked longing in his eyes. “But I couldn’t.”

Barry kicks at a patch of wet sand with his feet, and asks the question he’s been dreading. “Do you remember that night at STAR Labs—” that awful night— “after you rescued me, when I asked you how much of our relationship was real?”

“I remember,” Len says, bag abandoned beside him. He gives a sober nod at the water. “None of it was an act, Barry. I may not be all Captain Cold when I’m with you, but I’m all Leonard Snart.”

It’s just one more surprise, something that the old Len could never have said. He’s changing, Barry realizes. He doesn’t know quite how he feels about that.

Len sticks a hand back in the bag, pulling out a little drawstring pouch. His eyes widen slightly at it, as he pulls out what looks like a USB stick. “This has my aliases on. Every watertight backstory I’ve used. Guess Mick tossed it in here… I’ll kill him later.” He drops the USB onto the pile, lips curling up into a sneer. “The trouble with _anything_ built on lies, Barry, is that one truth can bring it all tumbling to the ground.”

That hits Barry with a force so hard, it makes his chest constrict. He hears the hitch in his own breath. So does Len, if the way he looks at Barry is anything to go by.

“Especially the lies I told,” Len adds, low and quiet. “You could have paid the ultimate price for those.” 

Staring at him, Barry is thrown back to a recent conversation with Dr. Harford. 

_Will I ever be able to trust him again?_

_I don’t know. Will you, Barry?_

“I’ve been seeing a therapist,” he tells Len. It’s easier to say as he thought it would be. Len raises an eyebrow, and Barry shrugs. “It’s not as bad as when they used to tell me I was lying all the time.” Now there’s nothing but the truth. He kind of misses the lies.

Under the deepening shadow of the docks, Len’s face is still hard to make out, but he might look haunted. 

“I’m sorry,” Barry murmurs. “I had a terrible way of working through things, and you got hurt for it.”

“You’re not the one who should be apologizing,” Len growls… but he doesn’t. He pulls a black jacket from the bag. Sleek hands fiddle with the tassels on the end of the zipper, playing them like an instrument. “I screwed up.” 

Barry thinks it’s the closest he’s going to get to an apology tonight.

It’s not enough.

“You did.” 

Len flings the jacket onto the pile of clothes on his other side. “I should never have let you into my life, Barry. I ruin everything I touch, and you’re too good for—”

“Stop it,” Barry snaps. “You’re deflecting… and it’s not _true._ You can say all you want that we were only together three months, but I know you. I know you’re kind, and caring, and sweet, and treat me like I matter.” He tries to meet Len’s shadowed eyes. “You’re a good guy, Len.”

That gets him a snort. “And you’re a cliché, Barry Allen.” Len leans back on his hands. “Let’s say, for argument’s sake, that’s true. Can you square that with the rest of me?”

Captain Cold comes to mind first, vivid and dramatic in his parka and goggles, and Barry smiles. “I can’t say the Flash doesn’t enjoy flirting with you.”

Len chuckles. “D’you know how often I wanted to unmask you, out there?” He bumps Barry’s shoulder with his own. “Never met anyone like you. In the field, or at Jitters.”

They both laugh. For a moment, it’s glorious. Barry and Len. The Flash and Captain Cold. The way it should always have been. Maybe this is why Barry spent three months feeling like a lovesick teenager around Len. It was never _quite_ real… But it could have been.

Beside him, Len has pulled out a screwdriver from the bag. As Barry watches, he turns the unobtrusive little household tool in his hand. So simple, so safe, until it’s in Leonard Snart’s hands. Barry tries not to imagine a man bleeding out from his carotid artery, with that screwdriver in his neck. “I’m dangerous, Barry,” Len says, as if reading his mind. “Don’t know if you _should_ be able to square the two sides of me. The life I live, the things I do… It’s already hurt you once.”

Barry raises an eyebrow at the screwdriver. “Have you considered that that might be up to me?”

Len places the screwdriver carefully between them. “And how about what we learned on our reckless little weekend? We’re both dangerous.”

Reaching across, Barry picks it up, tests its weight in his hand. In the end, it’s just a screwdriver. What they do with it is up to them. “We’d need to renegotiate everything,” he says.

Beside him, Len stills. “What?”

“If we were going to try this again.”

While Len is silent, distracted, Barry reaches across and pulls out one last thing out of the almost-empty bag. A flashlight. 

He turns it on. In the cold, thin light, Len’s hint of a smile is a ray of hope. “I’d need to give you some time,” Len says. He shifts around to look at Barry. “Which is not a problem. I’ve been offered a… job, of sorts. In Coast City.”

Barry has questions, but they can wait. It can all wait.

“One thing scares me,” Len says, as Barry tries to remember if Leonard Snart has ever told him he was _scared_ before, wondering how deep this guy has fallen for him. “Don’t know if you’d risk hurting me anymore, in combat. I don’t wanna take away your right to defend yourself. One day, it might be all you’ve got.”

Barry follows Len’s troubled gaze down, to the lightning sizzling from his hands. Power, right at Barry's fingertips. No, it’s not the idea that Barry _wouldn’t_ hurt him that Len is scared of.

“We don’t try this again till we’re not afraid of each other in the field,” Barry says softly.

Len sighs, a sad, weary sound that breaks Barry’s heart. “Or in our homes.” 

It’s a place to start, at least.

“Better get this thing home,” Len says, starting to fold the neat piles of objects back into the bag they came out of. He pauses so briefly that only a speedster could have seen it. “This idea you’ve got, Barry, that I’m a good guy? Drop it. I’m not.”

Leaning back on his hands, Barry shoots back, “You’re wrong.” He doesn’t even have to think about it.

Zipping up the bag, Len leans forward, smirking just a little. “You’re the scientist. Prove it.” And he moves in closer, and looks at Barry like he knows he shouldn’t, and kisses him anyway. It feels like a goodbye.

A soft wave of yearning washes over Barry, for the— _Innocence_ is a strange word to use, about either of them, but that’s the only way he can name everything they’ve lost. Len’s gentle hand lingers on Barry’s cheek for just a moment longer, and Barry memorizes damp blue eyes and the shadow of a beautiful smile.

And then Len gets up and walks away. 

He stops at the jetty, gazing up towards the dark row of warehouses rising ahead of him. “Let’s say, for the sake of argument, we overlook all the damn ethical questions—goodness, dangerousness, all that shit. What would it take for me to fix this?”

Honesty is the only gift Barry has left to give him. “I don’t know if you can.” 

Len is gripping the edge of the jetty like a lifeline. “A hypothetical, then.” 

It’s only then that Barry registers the leather jacket Len is wearing—maybe the same one as the day they met at CC Jitters, all those months ago. No parka in sight.

“I don’t want you to change,” Barry admits, as much to himself as to Len. If he can’t love Len for the Captain Cold of him, did he ever love him at all?

“Oh, I’d say that’s up to me, wouldn’t you?” There’s more than a little Captain Cold in that drawl, and Barry can’t fight a smile. As Len half-turns his head in the pale glow of the flashlight, the fear and hope mixing in his eyes is painful to look at. “Not what I asked, though. What would it take?” 

This time, Barry knows the answer to that. “A sign that you won’t hurt me again. That you’re sorry.”

“Thank you.” Len turns a little more to aim that devastating smile at him. “Never met anyone like you, Barry. Think that’ll always be true.” 

Like the besotted teenager that a part of him always will be, when it comes to Leonard Snart, Barry’s speedster-quick heart skips a beat.

Then Len steps up onto the jetty and fades into the darkness, as though he was never there.

By the time Barry realises he’s still holding the flashlight, it’s too late to do anything about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to *two* wonderful beta readers, blueelvewithwings (who also helped with little plot things throughout) and RetroactiveCon (who also helped with a bunch of ideas when I got stuck including the go bag and Len’s mission), and really did I write any of this myself at all...? :D


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter. There's a heist and there's a date. In that order.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Excellently beta read by blueelvewithwings.

3 MONTHS LATER 

With his head in a suitcase, Barry is patiently explaining that he’s only going to Coast City to visit an old college friend, and that he’s not looking _anyone else_ up while he’s there. “Hal only has twenty-four hours of leave, Iris. It’s a flying visit. I won’t have time to do anything else.”

He removes his head from the suitcase just in time to see Iris shaking hers sadly. “Barry Allen, I don’t know which pun I’m more disappointed in you for missing. The obvious ‘flying’ pun about Hal Jordan, or how you didn’t even switch that out for ‘running’ visit.”

Barry rolls his eyes. He’s not dignifying those with an answer. Lowest form of humour, and all that.

“Of course,” Iris adds, suddenly apparently very interested in the cobwebs in the corner of Barry’s room, “there’s someone you could track down this weekend who I’m sure would be willing to help you with your punning skills.” She grins mock-innocently at him.

Barry throws a pillow at her. “Like I said, I don’t even have his address right now.”

“Oh, and Cisco couldn’t look that up?”

Barry snorts. “Might make up for some other stalking he did… But no. I’m not asking.” He reaches for a pair of jeans, folding them into the suitcase. “I’m being responsible, remember?”

“Yes,” she says like she doesn’t believe him. She sits down on the edge of the bed. “Barry, if you both keep waiting for each other, is either of you ever going to break the ice first?”

Eyebrows raised, Barry waits.

Iris laughs. “Admit it, that wasn’t a bad one.”

He gives in and chuckles. Jumping onto the bed, he grabs the stuffed Beebo toy that Martin Stein gave him last time he was in town. It has something to do with the ever more ridiculous things that the Legends get up to, apparently. “If I did look him up… You think it’d be too soon?”

Iris is taking that question seriously, frowning hard at him. “You’re the only one who can decide that, Barry. But one of you has to jump first with making contact again.” She smiles sadly at him. “You’ve been really patient.”

“Doing my best.” He squeezes the plushie to his chest. Being apart from Len has slowly been getting easier, through the long weeks that have run into months, but the ache has never quite gone away.

“Hey.” Iris throws an arm over his shoulder. “If you’re not ready, that is one hundred percent up to you.”

As he smiles at her through slightly damp eyes, there’s the sound of a key turning in the door. Joe’s voice calls out, “You here, Barr?”

“In the bedroom,” Barry calls back, and grimaces. “I should _not_ mention this to Joe, right?”

“Mention what?” Joe asks from the door. His arms are full of a sports bag that he puts down on the bed. “Brought some of your old summer clothes. Gets hot on the West Coast.” While Barry's brain is catching up with the rest of him, Joe raises a knowing eyebrow. “Iris said you were going to see Hal. And yeah, I _do_ know who else lives in Coast City.”

Barry drops his head onto his knees, while Iris pats him on the back. “I had to get a detective for a foster father.”

“Well, you never were very subtle,” Joe observes. 

Joe looks a hell of a lot calmer than the last time they talked about Leonard Snart, but his forehead is still crinkled with worry. Barry risks asking, “How would you feel if I did meet up with him?”

Joe takes a couple of steps away, leaning in the doorframe. “It’s your life, Barr. Your choices.” He scratches his head. “I might have been working on remembering that.”

“Uh-huh,” Iris says doubtfully. Barry elbows her. 

But his eyes are on Joe, who’s watching him with a strange kind of approval. “He’s respected your wishes and stayed away. And I’m guessing you’ve been thinking hard about things, too.”

He didn’t expect this from Joe. It’s almost permission. But it might be too late for that. Barry gets up, grabbing the Flash suit and folding it into his bag—for any Coast City emergencies he hopes don’t find their way to him. “This is a moot point, guys. I don’t know where he is, and I’m not gonna look for him.”

He lets his hand rest on the lightning bolt that sits over his heart.

_Never met anyone like you, Barry. Think that’ll always be true._

Then he pulls a plain t-shirt out of the stack of his old summer clothes, throwing it into the suitcase before zipping it up. Just in case he does decide to stay in Coast City an extra day.

* * *

The sun is high in the sky when Len trundles off his bike and into the cliff-top cottage, overlooking the bay. He’s greeted at the door by Jared, the young guy who manages the Safe Metas (Coast City) operation. Who scowls at Len. “What are you doing here today, old man?”

Len always appreciates Jared’s disdain. “Relax, kid. Just brought you those back door keys. Don’t worry, I’ve been getting my rest.” He drops the keys into Jared’s hand.

Pocketing them, Jared deadpans, “You better. We can’t afford the medical bills if you keel over.”

With perfect timing, Frankie Kane chooses that moment to stride out of the admin office towards the kitchen. “He does not speak for me,” she calls over her shoulder.

Len shoots her a grin, but his thoughts turn serious as he takes Jared in. Yesterday he and Len got three young metas out of a lab that could have come straight out of a horror movie. “Did they all get to the hospital okay?” 

Leaning back against the wall beside him, Jared nods. “Thanks to you, yeah. Laura’s been discharged already—Sofía picked her up this morning. She’ll be safe in the Central City house tonight.” He drops his voice to a conspiratorial murmur. “Those girls have one hell of a _hero_ to thank for their lives.”

Len pushes off the wall with one foot. “This old man must be losing his hearing. Didn’t get a word you said there.”

Jared laughs, vaulting over the reception counter and sitting down. “What you doing with the rest of your day off?” 

At the door, Len looks back over his shoulder. “Oh, I don’t know.” He aims for a tone of staged nonchalance. “Thought maybe I’d do a little shopping. Been here more than two months and I haven’t checked out a single jewelry store.”

“Guess I need my hearing checked too.” Jared is clearly trying not to smile into his book. “If they catch you, we ain’t bailing you out, old man.”

Len snorts. “Please. There’s only one person who’s ever managed that, and I’m pretty sure he’s not coming.” He ignores how that thought brings on a dull ache, low in his gut. 

Reaching his bike, Len pats the kit bag on the back of his bike, where some unassuming sports gear hides a parka and a pair of goggles. _Probably_ not coming. Even for someone who’s seen as much as Len, hope springs eternal.

* * *

Cold has picked out a branch of a big chain jewelry store where the manager is on vacation and he knows security is lax. He doesn’t even have to smash a single display case. He didn’t really want to, but he wasn’t above it, if the alarms hadn’t gone off. As it is, they start wailing as soon as he breaks in through a wedged-open window.

“Boys in blue!” he says, when they’re finally kind enough to turn up. He leans back against a poorly-reinforced case containing a million-dollar diamond necklace, folding one leg over the other. “You came. How very _cool_ of you.”

He hasn’t reached for the cold gun yet. Even if a certain _deal_ has probably expired by now, there’s no need for anyone to get hurt.

“Cold,” warns one of the poor, unsuspecting Coast City cops, “step away from the jewelry.”

He doesn’t even get a chance to think of a quippy reply. He tilts his head, the dawn of a smile on his lips. “Listen,” he murmurs.

That sound. That beautiful, hopeful rush of wild wind. That crackle of static electricity at his fingertips. That scent of a storm on the way—and is there a soul in the world who could stand against that storm, when it races through the world, razing the ground where mere mortals can only walk? 

“It’s okay, guys,” sighs an achingly familiar voice from outside. “I’ve got this one.”

The curtain of cops parts for him, and they scatter. As they should. By the time he steps inside, it’s just the speedster and the thief. 

He’s really been trying to cut back on the puns, but there’s no better word for it. As the Flash steps inside, Cold feels himself _freeze._

But he recovers his cool quickly enough. He glances around to see if he can spot any CCTV cameras he hasn’t already deactivated. There’s one high up in the corner, and he takes aim, spraying it with a thick layer of ice. And then he lowers his hood—but not his goggles, because he hasn’t completely taken leave of his senses—and beams at his nemesis. “Hello, Flash!”

“You know,” the Flash says, leaning in the doorway, amused eyes taking in the jewelry store, “this is really very disappointing.” 

His tone communicates something far from disappointment, but Len can play along. He waves a hand around the store, at precious jewels and fine gold, all worth far less than the man standing before him now. “Less grandiose than my usual targets, I’ll admit, but it’s not like I have a crew to watch my back anymore.”

“That's not quite what I meant.” A cowl-cowered head tilts. “And you really dressed for the Coast City weather, I see.”

In fairness, Len is quite hot under the parka, but he’s got too much style to admit that. “Please. I bring my own chill.”

The Flash snorts, and it almost breaks the illusion. He’s almost just Barry again, that lovable dork Len has missed beyond any words he could say. But then the Flash pulls himself upright again, eyes flickering as he takes a careful step forward. But he’s not trying to hide the lightning in his eyes.

Cold’s hand moves, almost without thinking, to his gun. 

The Flash stops walking. Slowly, he pushes back his cowl. Then he takes another step. 

Cold drops his hand.

“It’s just me,” Barry murmurs, close enough to touch, now. There’s gooseflesh raising on Len’s arms under the parka, fizzing with static. 

Len feels the beginnings of a smirk peeking its way out. “Hey.”

Grinning, the Flash leans back against a counter beside him, waving a hand around. “Is this all in my honor?”

Len tips back his head and laughs, more delighted than he thought even this little game of a heist could make him. “Please. Didn’t even know you were here—but sure, let’s say it’s for you, Flash.”

That eyebrow raise from the Flash has only a hint of judgement beneath it. “Didn’t you say you were going to Coast City to _work?”_

“And I am.” He hops up onto the counter, spreading his hands. “What can I say? I just miss the thrill of a good heist now and then.” No point in admitting that this is the first job he’s attempted since he got here. Not wanting to lie to Barry is one thing. Looking after his well-crafted image, when they’re facing off in the field, is another. It’s not like the _hero_ beside him is much better about that.

“Uh-huh,” the Flash says, attempting to use his unimpressed voice, while Len pretends not to find that appallingly cute. He nods at the bag Cold is grasping. “You know I can’t let you take that, don’t you?”

“I’m having deja-vu,” Cold drawls. He taps the cold gun. “Not even if I get away with it fair and square?”

Laughing, Barry holds out a hand. “You’re not gonna shoot me.”

 _Dammit._ With a pointedly overdramatic sigh, Len hands over the bag. “And I suppose you’re gonna turn me in, too?”

“I mean…” The Flash purses his lips. “If you escaped, I couldn’t, could I?”

Now, there’s a surprise. “And how,” he drawls, “am I going to do that, without shooting you?”

The Flash taps an invisible earpiece, making it very clear he’s not wearing comms. “Maybe I just got a call about another enemy, far worse than you, down the coast from here. Maybe I’ve gotta run.” Len raises an eyebrow, but refuses to rise to the obvious bait. Worse than him? _As if._

Until that moment, he hadn’t thought to wonder why the Flash is in Coast City. Is this a vacation? Len could almost feel guilty about disturbing it, except that he’s far too pleased to see him.

But Captain Cold always knew a good deal when he heard one, and he’s practically at the door already. He spins around on his heel, throwing his nemesis a lifeline. “May not have been _expecting_ you, but it’s possible I was… hoping.”

He knows that bashful smile the Flash aims at him. _There you are._ “Yeah?” Barry murmurs. 

Len knows he should just leave, but he _can’t._ Not without laying out the offer, and seeing if Barry will take it. “Seven-thirty tonight. Northport Beach.”

And then he’s gone, taking only a desperate hope that Barry will follow the lead.

As he rides away, Len is wishing he could see the Flash’s face when he opens the bag and finds it empty. Len hasn’t lifted a scrap of jewelry, but he rather likes the idea of Barry thinking he’s made off with the lot.

* * *

Barry arrives at Northport Beach half an hour early.

It’s the kind of place that, in the middle of summer, would be thronging with tourists. As it is, on this late spring evening, there are only a few walkers and locals here. A couple of teenage girls, hand in hand, laughing as they stumble through the sand dunes—Barry smiles at them as they head off into the beginnings of a sunset. A boy with his dog, playing on the edge of the shore. And…

And Len. Sitting beside an iron fire pit that he must have dragged onto the beach himself. With an actual wicker picnic basket. Hands fidgeting on his knees, eyes flitting left and right, looking for all the world as if he’s nervous. But that can’t be right. Len is smooth, suave, _cool._ What does he have to be nervous about?

It’s only then, as Barry steps carefully through the sand, that he feels his own heart trying to thump its way out of his chest. _It’s just Len,_ he tells himself.

The two of them have communicated exactly twice since their last conversation at the docks, which was almost three months ago. A week later, Len called to tell him he was leaving, and they agreed a break from contact might be good. Then there was an actual, physical letter, in which Len said he was doing well, and to ask Lisa for his details if Barry needed him. Both times had hurt, before Barry settled into the long ache of realization that this was exactly what they needed.

But right now, it feels like they’ve been apart forever.

As he approaches, he can see Len staring out to sea, so lost in thought that he doesn’t seem to register Barry dropping down next to him. “This sand is damp,” Barry complains, not reacting to the sharp turn of Len’s head. “It’ll be hell to get out of my jeans tomorrow.”

In a voice that has the potential to break Barry’s heart, or heal it, Len says, “...You made it.”

“I made it,” Barry echoes. It’s so good to see Len smile. It’s been too long.

Len’s eyes fall apologetically to the picnic basket. “I didn’t know if this should be a _date,”_ he murmurs. “If it’s too much…” He trails off, tapping out a pattern on the side of the basket that only Barry could read as anxiety. “We did miss our lakeside picnic, that night you were…”

_Oh._

This isn’t just a date. It’s an apology.

Barry takes a deep, shaky breath. “It’s perfect.” 

Sudden as an ice storm, Len grins, waving his hand at the fire pit. “Got permission. You believe that? Actually asked a lifeguard. Fires are allowed _in_ _a safe receptacle in low season.”_

Barry snorts. “You did what?” Who is this man, and what has he done with Barry’s maybe-ex-boyfriend?

“Yup. Maybe you’ll reform me yet.” Len’s gaze has gone distant at the sea again.

This is weirdly uncomfortable, and Barry doesn’t know why. He tries small talk. “How’s Coast City?” When Len turns a sharp, questioning look on him, Barry says, “I have a friend here. He’s kinda been keeping me updated on whether you’re still around.”

Len nods at the horizon, apparently unconcerned by the stalkerish implications of that. Maybe he’s been keeping his own eye on Barry. The thought makes Barry smile a little, even if it shouldn’t. Len says, “Sorry I didn’t tell you myself.”

“It’s fine,” Barry murmurs. “I mean, I did ask you to give me space.”

Len’s eyes shift left to give him a wily glance. “Tell me, Barry Allen. Why is this so fucking awkward?”

Barry lets out a startled laugh. “Oh, thank God I’m not the only one feeling it.” He thumbs behind him, indicating the vague direction of the jewelry store where they clashed earlier. “But then it was always easier in costume, with us, wasn’t it?”

Beautiful ice-blue eyes crinkle and sparkle, just like they did on the day Barry met him. “Yeah, it really is.”

His switch to the present tense makes Barry’s heart soar, but he tries not to show it too much. He nods hopefully at the picnic basket. “I feel like this conversation would go a bit more smoothly with food.” 

“You work on that.” Len’s face twinkles with a grin that makes Barry’s heart do a little somersault. Reaching into the basket, he produces a lighter, waving it around like the prize score from a well-executed heist. “I’ll work on _heating things up_ a little.”

Barry laughs out loud. God, he’s missed this ridiculous man. 

The first thing he finds in the basket is a bottle of champagne. He holds it up, raising an eyebrow. “And what exactly were you hoping to achieve with this, Len?”

If the word ‘bashful’ could ever be applied to Leonard Snart, that’s what his shrug is. “There’s juice and beer too…” he starts to protest. Then he sighs, deflating just like he does every time the Flash foils one of his jobs. “Wanted to spoil you a little. Bad idea?”

“No,” Barry says softly, trying not to gaze at him and give away how damn much he’s missed Len’s dramatic gestures of affection.

Ahead of them, the sun begins its descent, heralded by a splash of oranges and reds across the horizon. By the time Len has finished building the fire, there’s a full sunset painting the sky, and the beach around them is pretty much deserted. Barry looks around, grinning. “They can’t say you don’t have timing.”

Len laughs, settling down by the fire pit, his eyes on Barry. “Not like you.”

Barry pauses halfway through setting out a homemade salad, biting his lip. The earlier awkwardness was masking a whole box of other feelings, and only now has he remembered how scared he is. He doesn’t even know what he’s afraid of… until Len smiles at him. That secret smile, the one that only came out over quiet pancakes and lazy days in bed and furtively-held hands in the back of empty movie theaters. The smile that Barry never saw out in the open, on Captain Cold’s face. 

How do they keep from backsliding right into the past again?

There’s a hand on his neck. “Barry.” Len has crouched down beside him, eyes dark and concerned. “If you don’t want to do this, we pack everything up, and go our separate ways. Until you’re ready.” He swallows, a ripple of fear down the line of his throat. “Even if that’s never.” 

Len has gone to all this effort, for him, and he’s willing to let it all go if Barry’s not ready for this. All Barry’s own fear fizzles away. It’s just a date. They can take this one step at a time.

Reaching down, Barry pulls two plastic champagne flutes out of the basket, trying not to laugh at the sweet detail. Len has really thought of everything. Holding up the glasses, Barry says, “Do the honors before I change my mind.”

An almost-smirking Len manages to pop the champagne cork without _quite_ taking the lifeguard’s eye out. “Damn,” he mourns, watching the cork roll away down the beach. “My aim used to be better than that.”

“Nope, it really didn’t,” Barry shoots back, then sneaks a glance up at Len’s face. Worth it.

They talk about nothing and everything as they eat, both steadily getting more relaxed than Barry could have anticipated. But as they start on the cupcakes, Len’s eyes have gone distant again. He bumps Barry’s shoulder. “Come for a walk with me.”

Barry has vacuumed up every last crumb of food, but he nods at the nice picnic basket. “Aren’t you worried about that getting stolen?”

Len gives him a wicked tilt of his head. “Wasn’t exactly acquired via the most _legal_ of methods to begin with.”

Muttering, Barry shoves the basket towards the lifeguard’s station and takes a chuckling Len’s hand. He tries not to think about how he’s missed the feel of Len’s guitar-hardened callouses, how the strong, slow pulse under Len’s thumb calms his nerves. Hand in hand, they make their way towards a red sky that never gets any closer. He doesn’t know how it's happened so quickly, but suddenly Barry feels like they could walk off the edge of the world together, and everything would be okay.

After a long silence, charged with anticipation like the air before lightning, Len clears his throat. “Barry,” he starts… and trails off. Leonard Snart, of all people, is apparently struggling to find words. “I owe you an apology,” he finishes, at last.

_At last._

“Don’t really know where to start,” Len murmurs. There’s something raw and unguarded in his eyes that Barry isn’t sure he’s ever seen there before. Maybe that day on the riverbank, when he forced a few confessions about Len’s past out of him. But not often.

Nodding, Barry squeezes his hand, but he doesn’t interrupt. Len has to get there on his own. 

“Two months since I’ve been here,” Len says. “Three since I’ve seen you. Haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.” He takes a deceptively even breath and blows it out again. “I couldn’t tell you I was sorry till I knew I wouldn't make the same shitty mess of it as that night at STAR Labs.”

Barry nods through the vicious spike of pain that comes with that memory. “You told me you didn’t regret what you did.” He’s surprised at the hurt in his own voice. The betrayal is still a little raw, even now, after months of therapy.

There’s awful guilt in Len’s eyes, darting left to meet Barry’s. “And if circumstances were the same again, I’d probably make the same mistake. That’s just the kind of man I am.” His steps slow a little, forcing Barry to slow down with him. “But I do regret it. Every day. I’m sorry, Barry. I’m _so_ sorry. I never meant—” He shakes his head at the sky. “Fuck it. Doesn’t matter what I didn’t mean to happen. I screwed up, and I hurt someone I love. And now all I can do is make sure it never happens again.” 

“Okay…?” Barry wants to kick himself as soon as he says it. That apology is more than he ever thought he’d get from Len, and it deserves a better response than that. But Barry is honestly kind of floored. He tries again. “So what does that mean, exactly?”

Len is quiet, for just a moment, before he answers. “I’m giving up the Rogues. To Lisa.” 

At the edge of the shore, with the tiny waves washing in and out between them, Barry stops dead. “You’re _what?”_

Len turns around to look at him, eyebrows creased into a frown. Then he walks on, tugging at Barry’s hand to keep him moving. He can’t look him in the eye and say this, Barry realizes, and a wave of empathy washes over him. “It’s complicated,” Len says. “This ain’t just about you, Barry. The work I’m doing now—it’s important.” Squeezing Barry’s hand, he adds, “What I did to you, I did to protect my family. This…”

He trails off, clearly unable to say it, but Barry gets the message. This is to protect him. It’s what Barry asked for—a sign that Len won’t risk hurting him again. But he doesn’t know if he wants this offering. It might be too much. “So what does that mean for Captain Cold?” 

“Don’t know yet.” The waves bubble around and between their feet, great tidal monsters rendered harmless by the shore. Len sighs. “I haven’t been happy for a long time, Barry. I thought bending Central City to my will was all I wanted. It wasn’t.” He glances sideways, something profound in his eyes. “Just didn’t know it till I met you.”

Barry wants to hug him for that admission. He doesn’t, yet, but it feels like something has shifted between them.

They’re heading back towards the fire pit now, where the logs are glowing heart-blood red. Len drops to his knees, reaching for a stick to poke at them, and they burst back into flame under his hands. 

Too late, Barry realizes he’s given away how impressed he is, when Len smirks up at him. “A thirty year partnership with Mick Rory taught me a few things.”

Barry chuckles, wrapping his arms around his legs. They watch the fire for a while, the silence too full of feeling to interrupt with words. As night wraps around them like a blanket, they end up lying face to face on the sand, close enough that Barry can feel Len’s breath. There’s so much he wants to say, but he doesn't push. He’s figured Len out pretty well in only a few months, and he knows how much time the guy needs to process. Especially when it comes to pesky feelings.

Len points just above the horizon at a half-moon becoming steadily brighter. “You said you wanted to moongaze. That night we never got to meet up.”

“I did.” Staring up into the moon’s dim, steady light, Barry feels something crack inside him, a too-stretched thread that’s been waiting for months to break.

It takes Len reaching up to touch his face, saying, “Hey…” before Barry realizes he’s crying.

He swipes at his eyes. “Sorry.”

“No,” Len murmurs, shifting closer, dropping his forehead against Barry’s, right there in the sand. “I’m the one who’s sorry,” he says, running a hand through Barry's hair.

Closing his eyes, Barry shakes his head against him, but he can’t explain. It’s not just Len’s apology. It’s what it might mean for the two of them. He hasn’t let himself imagine what comes next. “I’ve missed you,” is all he manages. If he came out and said _my life isn’t complete without you in it,_ it might scare the poor guy away. 

Or maybe it wouldn’t.

“Yeah,” Len murmurs, a broken whisper. “Me too.”

Barry’s eyes are clearing as he opens them, meeting Len’s gaze. “Len, I want to…” He trails off. _Try again?_ No. That sounds like they’d be going backwards once more, and that was a terrible mistake the first time round. He clears his throat. “I want to start over. If you do.”

Len’s smile is more beautiful than the moonlight. “I’d like that.”

Turning his face towards the stars, Barry takes Len’s hand. “But it’s gotta be different.”

“Yeah,” Len agrees, his whisper still full of hopes he never dared believe in. “I don’t know what that looks like,” he admits.

Barry turns his head sideways to take him in. “What’s different about your life now?”

Len raises his eyebrows at the vast night sky, his voice lifting over the crackle of the fire. “In some ways, not a lot. It's still about the thrill of the chase. But more important things, too.” Shifty eyes flicker towards Barry’s. “Not saying I’m _entirely_ giving up the day job.”

A laugh escapes Barry as he makes air quotes with his free hand. “The ‘day job’ that has a parka for a uniform? I think I’d almost be disappointed if you did.”

A grinning Len shrugs almost apologetically. “Even my new job isn’t strictly legal.” He sighs. “That’s gonna be a problem for you, isn’t it?”

Barry turns his head back to the sky as he thinks. Yeah, it might be a problem. He and Len could never go public. But how much of Barry’s life does he live in public anyway? He shrugs. “What I do behind the Flash suit isn’t legally sanctioned, either. I might have the blessing of the mayor, but I’d be alone in a courtroom if something went wrong. But I keep on doing the hero thing anyway.” 

The curve of Len’s smile is approving. “You and me weren’t made for safe lives, Barry. These are the risks we live with.”

_The risks they live with..._

Abruptly, Barry turns, rising up on his elbow to look down at Len. Who says, “I know that sparkle in your eyes, Scarlet. You’re plotting mischief.”

Barry hopes his grin doesn’t give away too much delight yet. “You’re staying here, aren’t you—where you’re not exactly widely known?”

Len nods. “For now.”

“Do you know how long it took me to get here?” 

Len’s eyes narrow as if he’s trying to figure out the puzzle of Barry Allen. “Guessing not very long.”

Barry is really enjoying stretching this out. “There’s all kinds of factors my speed depends on, but I can reliably run at Mach 13.” Len’s dull blink is cute. “It took me about twenty minutes, Len.”

Len’s dawning understanding is even cuter. Slowly, he sits up. “You could do that regularly?” His grin matches Barry’s now. 

“Mm-hmm.” Barry accepts Len’s hand and lets him pull him up into a sitting position. “Oh,” he adds idly, “and did I mention my father left me a cabin in his will? It’s just a few miles inland from here. Kind of idyllic.”

Len is looking at Barry like he’s given him the best gift he’s ever had. “Weekends?” he asks like he doesn’t quite believe it.

“Twice a month to start?” Barry suggests, grinning. “Should be enough to start to figure out if we can work out how to do this differently. And how the hell we’re gonna make it work at all.”

Len is shaking his head like he can’t think of a thing to say. The idea that Barry has made Captain Cold _speechless_ is all too delightful.

Maybe it’s too early to be this happy, but Barry can’t help it. He leaps up, nodding at the dark edge of the water. “Come and splash with me.” Len’s eyebrows shoot up his forehead, but Barry doesn’t give him a change to complain. “Come _on,”_ he whines, tugging at Len’s hand.

A laughing Len lets himself be led towards whispering waves, only just illuminated by the firelight. He stops up short before they get to the edge. “Wait— Barry, wait.” 

Barry turns back.

Then there’s a cool, calloused hand on the side of his face, so familiar that Barry feels tears threatening behind his eyes again. “Are you sure?” Len whispers.

He laughs up at the sky. “Of course I’m not _sure,_ Len.” Shaking his head at his ridiculous thief, Barry says, “If you want a guarantee, you really got into the wrong relationship for that.”

There’s still guilt in Len’s eyes, but it’s waning, slowly replaced with hope. “Well, I guess no one gets that.”

“Nope.” Barry smoothes his own hand across the soft curve of Len’s face. “But do I want to try and figure out a way to make this work? Yes, I do.” He’s never been so sure of anything. This is all he wants—the chance to give it one last go, with everything out in the open. The chance to fail or succeed as themselves, and no one else. His hand pauses on Len’s cheek. “Do you?”

Barry’s first warning of the kiss is warm breath on his face, and then Len’s soft lips are firm and steady against his own. Another hand rises to the other side of Barry’s face, eager lips pressing deeper. He loops his arms around Len’s neck, kissing him back, hard and just a little frantic, till Len slows him down.

They melt into each other, the tide lapping at their feet, the night dissolving around them.

“Hi,” Len says after they drift apart, and Barry realizes he’s been gazing at him for just a little too long. And then Len’s grin drops away, eyes looking right through Barry into the past. “What's gonna stop us from making the same mistakes all over again?”

Thinking that question over, Barry reaches down to take off his shoes and socks. Len follows with a quirk of a mischievous eyebrow, tossing his boots behind him onto a dry patch of sand. Barry takes his hand as soft, cool waves froth over their feet. Watching Leonard Snart meekly follow Barry’s lead is adorable, and so is the way Len yelps at a sudden spray of sea water that has them both jumping back, giggling like children. 

At last, when their excitement has died down with the trickle of the waves, Barry squeezes Len’s hand. _“We_ stop us from making the same mistakes again. We make different choices. Starting by laying everything out on the table. Honesty, all the way.” He says it so confidently that he thinks maybe he can believe himself, even if he’s a little terrified. But then, he’s probably not alone in that.

Len tilts his head at Barry. “Are we any different than we were the first time around?”

“I hope so,” Barry says, and Len smiles. Barry tugs on his hand. “Come on. The fire’s still burning. You can tell me more about the work you’re doing here.” 

As Len talks, Barry drops down to the sand, pillowing his head on his arms behind him, and listens, and listens, and listens. It’s not so much the work that captivates him, although that’s interesting, with a sprinkle of horrifying. It’s the way Len talks about it. The way he looks when he talks about the metas he and his team have rescued, a light in his face that Barry’s never seen there before. Except, maybe, from under goggles and a very fluffy hood.

The cool night breeze is soporific, and Barry dozes a little.

He likes that warm voice singing to him. “ _The way you changed my life,”_ it sings, _“no, they can’t take that away from me…”_

“Barry,” Len whispers in his ear, a little later. “How about I take you home?”

“‘M speedster,” he mumbles back. “The bike would take you _hours_ longer than it’d take me to just run back.” Barry’s head is pillowed on Len’s chest, and he’s so warm. No one is going to make him move.

His thief chuckles against him, a low vibration in his chest that Barry feels against his ear. “Yes, but you’re asleep.” 

Barry sits up in a hurry. “I’m awake.” The fire has gone out. He glances down at a watch that he is not wearing, because the battery ran out last week. “What time is it?” 

“Almost midnight.” Len peers at Barry. “Not sure I entirely trust you to get safely back to Central City when you're this tired, speedster or not.”

Barry sticks a hand in his pocket, feeling for the hotel room key card that he hung on to in case he wanted to stay another night. He was planning to drop back the key at the hotel before running home tonight, and he… didn’t. Why didn’t he? 

There’s a part of him wondering if this is the wrong thing to ask. But Barry quiets that inner voice. This time, he’s not being reckless. He’s learned a lot, and he trusts Len. More than that—he trusts himself. All they can do is make different choices. “Len, are you working tomorrow?”

Len shakes his head, scratching in the sand with his foot. It feels as if he wants Barry to take the lead here.

Ignoring his bashful hand rising to the back of his neck, Barry says, “I have my hotel room for another night.” Len meets his gaze with enigmatic eyes that are hard to read. Barry adds, “You can say no… but I’d love to spend another twenty-four hours with you. If you want to. Want to come back to the hotel with me. That is.” 

Oh, God. He’s rambling. He’s about to kick himself, but then he looks up. Len’s slowly-spreading smile is just a little besotted. That secret smile, that no one but Barry gets to see. It makes his speedster heart do another of those flip-flops that Len always brings on. Softly, Len says, “Thought you'd never ask.”

Laughing, Barry lets go of a breath, all in a rush. “Oh, thank God. I don’t know what I’d have done if you’d said no.”

Len chuckles. He looks up behind them at the steps rising to the street, turning back to nod at the fire pit. “I’ll come back for this tomorrow.”

Barry is getting the distinct feeling they should leave before one of them chickens out. “You want me to run us to the hotel?”

But Len smiles, shakes his head and links his arm into Barry’s. “Beautiful night, Scarlet. What do you say we walk?”

And so, arm in arm, they walk into the night together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for making it to the end! And to think when I started this, I thought it would have 3-5 chapters... I've left things open for a sequel, but that depends on whether I'm inspired to write one and whether I have time. If I don't manage to write one, I hope you're happy with the ending of this fic, and that it's hopeful enough!
> 
> HUGE thanks again to blueelvewithwings, who is a hero who beta read most of the 40K words here, and to RetroactiveCon for talking through a lot of ideas with me.

**Author's Note:**

> All comments gratefully received. Or I’m on tumblr as SophiaInSpace, if you wish to track me down and yell at me for the angst.


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